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REPORT 



ON 



WAR GHEST 





PRESENTED TO ! 

CONNECTICUT STATE COUNCIL OF DEFENSE 
By HENRY M. WRISTON 



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Digitized by the Internet Archive 
in 2011 with funding from 
The Library of Congress 



http://www.archive.org/details/reportonwarchestOOconn . 



JJ 



REPORT 



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ON 



WAR CHEST 
PRACTICE 




PRESENTED TO 

CONNECTICUT STATE COUNCIL OF DEFENSE 

By HENRY M. WRISTON 



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FOREWORD. 

The following report on the subject of war chest practice 
is the result of long interest and study and of something over 
two months exclusive application to the problem. The subject, 
however, is so large that even that amount of time has meant 
that the work has been done under great pressure and in haste. 
It would have been impossible but for the helpful and courteous 
cooperation of a number of people. It was the intention to 
acknowledge their help by name but the list has grown so long 
that none could be mentioned without distinctions that would be 
unfortunate. The writer wishes therefore to make, at once, 
acknowledgment to the officials of a large number of war chests, 
to the officers of the Fosdick Commission, the Red Cross, the 
Y. M. C. A., the War Camp Community Service, and to many 
others who have given a great deal of assistance. 

Under the circumstances of its preparation, this report un- 
questionably has many mistakes and many more failures prop- 
erly to evaluate individual features adopted by various cities. 
It is hoped, however, that the broad lines of war chest practice 
are accurately drawn and that the conclusions are not without 
some warrant in the evidence collected. 

For purposes of uniformity the city or town name has been 
used almost invariably rather than the name of the county, 
because it is more readily located in that way by most readers. 



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g- , NOTE. 

^^ Since the type was cast for this report, material changes 

have taken place in the situation. The investigation upon which 
this was built was devoted almost as much to finding ways of 
relief for communities through other methods as to the study of 
the War Chest movement, and the dominant idea behind it was 
that the then situation in regard to war relief activities was 
chaotic, both in the matter of financial support and administra- 
tive control. President Wilson has now published a letter ad- 
dressed to Mr. Raymond Fosdick of the War and Navy Depart- 
ments' Commissions on Training Camp Activities, which virtu- 
ally sets up a national War Chest for the seven agencies which 
are recognized and controlled by the Commission, and budgets 
are set definitely in the President's letter, and the proportion 
which each is to get, as well as the date on which the campaign 
is to begin. 

Moreover, the usual campaign for the sale of Christmas 
seals, to raise funds for the support of the anti-tuberculosis work 
in the United States, is this year to be combined with the Red 
Cross membership drive at Christmas time. It is said to be not 
impossible that the third Red Cross war fund will include next 
year's membership campaign, though no definite assurance can 
yet be given on that point in view of the fact that a rapidly alter- 
ing military situation makes it impossible for Red Cross offi- 
cials to determine when the next effort for funds will take place. 

Assuming that this step is taken, in addition to the other 
two, there would be three problems of some importance still un- 
solved, viz. : the elimination of the campaign for Armenian and 
Syrian relief, which has twice been conducted after Presidential 
proclamation ; second, the control of the large number of smaller 
unofficial war relief agencies who do not solicit by means of 
drives ; and third, there would be the problemi of supporting local 
war activities in many cases, such as the local Red Cross chapter, 
the campaign expenses for Liberty Bond and Thrift Stamp com- 
mittees, the means of support of the Farm Bureau, and, in some 
cases, the War Bureau. 

While, therefore, the situation has not entirely changed 
since this report was written, it is only fair to emphasize the fact 
that the steps, as taken, do afford a very serious measure of 
relief and obviate many of the difficulties which were respon- 
sible for the War Chest movement, and these considerations 
should be given most careful attention by any community which 
has thought of altering its methods of collecting funds. 

Another point which must, in fairness, be set forth on the 
other hand is that while the action of the President and the de- 
velopment of events have made the situation less acute, thus 
rendering the War Chest somewhat less necessary from the 
standpoint of bringing relief to communities, it does not wholly 
clear the situation, and it has simplified the task of disbursement 
by virtually setting fixed proportions. To that extent it has made 
the War Chest plan simpler and more practicable from a com- 
munity standpoint. It has further led many of those who 
opposed the War Chest to abandon opposition. 



TABLE OF CONTENTS 



FOREWORD 2 

CHAPTER ONE 

Introduction 6 

Relation to State Councils of Defense 11 

Productivity 12 

Dates' and Numbers of War Chests 14 

Duration of War Chest Pledges 15 

Incluisiveness ^ 19 

Agencies included 20 

Red Cross Membership 26 

Local Chariities 28 

CHAPTER TWO 

Structure of the War Chest 32 

Campaign Organization 38 

Overlapping 41 

Team Structure 43 

Check up on Workers 44 

100% Organizations 45 

Badges . 46 

Campaign Divisions 46 

Score Boards 52 

Instructions to Workers 52 

CHAPTER THREE 

The Campaign 56 

Census 56 

Other Methods 62 

Prospect Cards' 63 

Rating 65 ' 

Suggested Amounts 68 

Basis of Pledge 77 

Form of Contribution 80 

Pledge Forms 82 

Designated Gifts 89 

Competition 95 

Use of Pressure 97 

Follow-up Subscriptions 103 

4 



CHAPTER FOUR 

Collections 108 

Industrial Collections 108 

Frequency of Deductions 112 

Patriotic Half -Hour 113 

Personal Collections 118 

Collections by Solicitors 118 

Centralized Collections 120 

Decentralized Collections 120 

Methods of Payment 122 

Experience with Voluntai*y Payments 123 

Voluntary Units 124 

Bills- 125 

Bank Drafts 126 

Notes 128 

Following up Collections 128 

Bookkeeping and Accounting 130 

The Salem System 131 

Philadelphia 132 

Albany 134 

Glens Falls , 134 

Syracuse 134 

Columbus 135 

Detroit 135 

Conclusions 136 

CHAPTER FIVE 

Disbursements 138 

Administrative Expenses 138 

Budgets 141 

Other Methods of Disbtirsements 146 

Suggested Set of By-Laws 154 



INTRODUCTION. 

The war chest is simply one phase of a movement for 
reform in the methods of financing the agencies auxiliary to the 
conduct of the war. There are many other illustrations of the 
same purpose. It is said that as early as June there was held 
at Washington a conference looking toward a merger in the 
financial efforts of the agencies of the war and navy depart- 
ments commissions on training camp activities. The action of 
the Connecticut State Council of Defense, in issuing its state- 
ment to the Council of National Defense, is another illustration. 
The effort of the Illinois State Council of Defense to organize 
a regular and permanent financial committee in each community 
represents still another effort in the same direction. Bulletin 
114 of the Washington State Council of Defense outlines the 
solution proposed in that state. The inauguration of the Mer- 
cer County plan and similar efforts indicate the widespread 
character of this feeling. The mid-western representative of 
the Council of National Defense, Mr. John H. Winterbotham, 
reported that the question of supervising the solicitation of 
funds absorbs so much of the time and energy of some local 
councils that it detracts materially from their strength in other 
and more important lines of national defense work. 

The war chest, therefore, is simply one of a whole group 
of more or less related movements. It may be defined as a 
community effort to raise a fund from which the moneys nec- 
essary to the support of all war auxiliary agencies may be 
drawn. Beyond that definition cannot go, because there are 
such striking divergences of name, organization, policy, and 
practice. 

The war chest movement is frankly a givers' movement. 
Its point of view is fundamentally that of the man who is fur- 
nishing the money, not that of organizations which are asking 
for money, though it ought to be said at once that while there 
is a distinction between these two points of view there is no 
necessary hostility between them. From the standpoint of the 
individual giver the war chest is desirable. It allows him to 
look forward and plan what he is to do. In the case of the 
individual, one may reason in two fashions concerning the 
drive system. One may argue that by making a specialized 
appeal a man will be roused to an effort at giving which at a 
later time, under the stimulus of a new appeal, he will repeat 
and thus give more than he intended and more than he realizes. 
The other manner of reasoning says that knowing other de- 
mands are in store, but being unable to determine how many, 
a man holds back for the unforeseen, confuses many givings with 
much giving, thus believing that he has done better than he has. 
The only umpire between these two arguments— equally good 



theoretically and in some two individual cases equally good in 
practice — is production statistics. However that may be, the 
war chest calls upon a man to determine what part of his in- 
come he is willing to devote to the support of the humanitarian 
and recreational agencies for war service and to give that much. 
He is not fooled into giving more than he ought, nor does he 
fool himself into the belief that he has given more than he 
actually has. 

From the standpoint of the community it appears that 
there is no question as to the desirability of the war chest. 
One is compelled to this conclusion by the unanimous expres- 
sions of satisfaction on the part of all classes of war chest com- 
munities when one approaches them with the question as to their 
opinion of the new as against the old method. The war chest 
unquestionably saves a great deal of time and avoids much du- 
plicative effort. It obviates, too, the general disruption of busi- 
ness and minimizes the expenditure of energy. It also assures 
a much broader and more comprehensive basis of giving than 
did the system of separate drives. Being a community move- 
ment, it stimulates community pride and from that point of 
view is valuable. Testimony is unanimous as to the unifying 
effect upon the citizenship and increased community solidarity. 

From the standpoint of the smaller agencies there appears 
to be slight, if any, question as to the desirability of the war 
chest. The smaller organizations have not the same advertising 
or selling value as their better-known and larger collaborators. 
It must be admitted that there is not the same challenge in a 
call for $10,000,000 that there is in a call for $100,000,000, and 
it is consequently more difficult to create adequate organizations 
to raise money. Yet these agencies, many of them, come to the 
public with official endorsements as deserving adequate finan- 
cial support. The war chest plan makes it possible for them 
to get their proper share of the money raised without the heart- 
breaking effort that is now necessary. 

From the standpoint of the Red Cross and the' Y. M. C. A., 
the war chest movement is nothing to be feared, provided it is 
properly organized and wisely conducted. In some war chest 
cities the policy has undoubtedly been somewhat narrow. In 
some, perhaps, money has been unwisely spent. These mistakes 
and narrownesses have nothing to do with the war chest princi- 
ple. 

It may be true that the general adoption of the war chest 
would entail some alteration in the financial methods of the 
Y. M. C. A. and the Red Cross, but there would be no tendency 
to curtail the financial support of those great movements. 
There is of course the difficulty arising from the fact that the 
war chest is not universal and, being a community movement, 
will never become universal, and the Red Cross and Y. M. C. A. 
are compelled in consequence to adopt different methods in 



different places instead of having a uniform plan. This cannot 
be remedied unless those two organizations should endorse and 
adopt the war chest method. It may be said, however, that 
there are enough war chests so that they have already adjusted 
themselves to the problem created and that the multiplication 
of the war chests will probably not seriously complicate the 
problem. One should add to this the fact that the war chest 
movement is not the only one which exerts pressure in this di- 
rection. Most of the other state and local plans have much the 
same effect, and these, like the war chest, are gaining more and 
more currency. 

It has sometimes been said that the adoption of the war 
chest method destroys the moral effect of the great nation- 
wide intensive effort for the Red Cross or the Y. M. C. A., which 
it is hoped will have its repercussion in Germany. As a matter 
of fact, however, war chests may readily be influenced to make 
their subscriptions at that time and so create the same moral 
effect that would be produced upon the enemy by having a drive 
in every city. 

The National War Work Council of the Y. M. C. A. adopted 
a resolution opposing the war chest in which the only reason 
mentioned was that it did not seem to offer the same flexibility 
that the drive system allowed. With all deference to the opin- 
ion of the Y. M. C. A. officials in this matter, it is only fair to 
point out that there is not the same difficulty in this regard 
now that there was at an earlier stage. The reason is that the 
contest has reached such a stage that organizations can look 
forward with somewhat more accuracy in their efforts to de- 
termine what their needs are likely to be. 

The six agencies of the Fosdick Commission are this year 
submitting itemized and comprehensive budgets. The fact that 
that commission called for them is evidence that it is not an 
impossible task, and the fact that the initiative in the matter 
is said to have come from one of the large organizations is 
evidence that they do not regard it as unreasonable. Even last 
year the Y. M. C. A. drew up a budget for a period of several 
months and called for $35,000,000. It is said on good authority 
they were able to live within that budget during the period 
planned for. All of these facts go to indicate that a budget 
system is a practicable one and it is perfectly certain that an 
effort is being made to operate to some extent on that princi- 
ple. It must be said that in one sense some of these budgets are 
not "real", because the agencies hope for and expect over-sub- 
scriptions, which vitiates the budget system somewhat; but it 
does not alter the fact that with proper allowances for an emer- 
gency fund they can and do look forward to anticipate their 
needs. 

In the second place the war auxiliary agencies do not live 
under a peculiarly flexible system now, because they are not 

8 



entirely free to return to the public with a call for funds when- 
ever need arises. There are so many agencies in the field that 
when one takes into consideration the demands upon time by 
actual governmental needs, such as Liberty bond and war sav- 
ings stamp campaigns, any single agency is virtually precluded 
from returning to the public at a time determined wholly by 
itself, even though its funds may need replenishment. A letter 
from Mr. S. M. Greer, assistant general manager of the Ameri- 
can Red Cross says: "In deference to the needs of other de- 
partments of the Government after our budget had been deter- 
mined as nearly as was practical, and after we had announced 
the sum we desired to raise, we were compelled to postpone the 
date of our campaign upward of five months." One would 
suppose, and it is doubtless true, that the Red Cross would have 
the greatest consideration in this matter of any of the organi- 
zations, and yet it appears to have been compelled to wait five 
months in order to find an open date. 

These facts make it appear on one hand that the data nec- 
essary to make it possible for the war chest to determine the 
amount which it should raise will be more completely available 
this year than last, and secondly that the drive system is not as 
flexible as it has frequently been presumed to be. The con- 
clusion seems to be that while there is need that the war chest 
should plan for a considerable emergency fund, there is no long- 
er cause for serious worry with regard to the alleged lack of 
flexibility of the war chest method. 

It ought to be said in candor that for building an after-the- 
war clientele for most of these organizations, the war chest 
is not the ideal agency. It makes its fundamental appeal on 
the winning of the war rather than upon any auxiliary of the 
war. The Red Cross as the most catholic organization and the 
one of deepest appeal is inevitably put in the foreground. This 
means that so far as the Y. M. C. A., the K. of C. and the Recrea- 
tion Association of America ought to and wish to educate the 
public as to the value of their own particular work for after-the- 
war purposes, they must do it by whole-hearted cooperation in 
the war chest campaign and by purely educational efforts at 
other times unconnected with the raising of money. 

The war chest attempts to reduce the matter of giving to 
something like its proper proportion of expended effort. It 
seems altogether possible that in view of the tremendous num- 
ber of things on which the public needs education — war invest- 
ments, fuel and food conservation, not to mention such subjects 
as the aims and issues of the war — the matter of giving to war 
auxiliary agencies threatens under the perpetuation of the drive 
system to absorb more than its proper share of time and energy. 
This is not intended to reflect upon the situation last year, but 
simply to apply to present conditions and such conditions as 
appear to be developing. With the increase of war activities 



and with the departure of more and more men for military 
service, it seems fair to say that if these agencies can be sup- 
ported with the expenditure of less effort and time, there will 
still be plenty that remains to be done so that neither the time 
nor the effort thus saved will be idle. 

The arguments for and against the war chest have been 
recited so many times that it is not necessary to repeat them 
here. It is worth while, however, to emphasize that the war 
chest makes possible the democratization of giving. The indus- 
trial worker is given his opportunity to participate as never 
before, particularly in agencies other than the two leading ones. 
He has seldom been called upon, save through the war fund, to 
contribute to the support of the local Red Cross. The supple- 
mentary calls for the support of the local chapter have usually 
been confined to a relatively narrow circle. This, of all war 
relief activities, particularly in view of the development of the 
home service feature, should be a community enterprise on the 
broadest possible basis and above the slightest suspicion that it 
is a charitable agency in the hands of a social group or class. 
The war chest integrates a larger share of the community 
in all the war auxiliary movements, and if an effort is made 
to publish not only the amount of the war chest appropriation 
but also the agency to which it is going and the nature and value 
of its work, that integration may be made real and not merely 
formal. 

Finally, the war chest method makes possible a fairer dis- 
tribution of the community gift than is now possible. Without 
attempting to discount the divergences and the occasional ab- 
surdities in this matter which are set forth elsewhere in this 
report, it must be said that they are not as great nor as absurd 
as those which appear to have been obtained under the drive 
system. This after all is natural. A body of men, usually small 
and of more than average intelligence, can by careful study and 
thought arrive at a saner and fairer conclusion than can be 
reached by a process of having a quota assigned, then campaign- 
ing in an effort to reach or over-reach it, the result being a 
total which no one could possibly forecast and which is difficult, 
often, logically to justify. Occasionally it is argued that the 
total justifies itself because every agency should have as much 
support as it can convince the public it needs. That argument 
does not seem to be sound. Some organizations have work 
which is spectacular and which has an emotional appeal. Others 
have work more prosaic in character though no less necessary; 
theirs must be a purely intellectual appeal. The funds result- 
ing from these two sorts of appeal are not likely to furnish an 
accurate gauge of the relative values of the two organizations. 
In short, the difference in methods of apportioning the commu- 
nity gift leads to a conclusion wholly in favor of the war chest 
as against the drive method. 

10 



The conclusion which these considerations induce is that 
the war chest and related expedients were produced and are 
being propagated because of evils in the present system which 
are admitted by the leaders of the chief organizations. If 
there had been only one or two organizations in the field, the 
present situation would never have arisen; but in view of the 
large number of them, and in view of the methods adopted by 
the Government in marketing bonds and war savings stamps, 
community action in self defense is justifiable. Though the 
war chest is, from the point of view of the two great organiza- 
tions, somewhat inconvenient, there is no evidence that it is 
harmful and its benefits to the communities outweigh its incon- 
venience to the organizations, much as any such inconvenience 
is to be regretted. 

Relation to State Councils of Defense. 

Five state councils of defense, namely, those of Michigan, 
New Mexico, New York, Washington, and Wisconsin have ad- 
vocated a state-wide adoption of the war chest plan. Few, 
however, appear to be taking a very active part in meeting and 
helping to solve the problems which are inevitably involved in 
the war chest. Generally speaking, state councils simply en- 
dorse or disapprove the war chest without making an effort to 
make their approval or disapproval effective. For example, in 
Illinois, where it is necessary for any agency which desires to 
collect funds to have a license from the state council of defense, 
war chests have not been refused licenses, though the council 
has disapproved the plan, as have the councils of Indiana, Ten- 
nessee, Virginia, and Massachusetts. 

The Washington State Council of Defense has taken two 
steps in this matter which are a distinct help to war chest cities. 
It has set a county quota which is fixed, being expressed in 
terms of percent, and in this manner has made it possible for 
war chest cities to determine w^hat they ought to pay organiza- 
tions. It also forbids over-subscription, which removes another 
embarrassing problem. The Washington Council, moreover, 
has dealt with the question of local charities participating by 
stating that campaigns for the support of institutions not organ- 
ized primarily for war work may not be combined with appeals 
for funds for war work. Appeals for the war work of local 
institutions may not be combined with campaigns for state and 
national war funds, save with the special approval of the State 
Council of Defense. 

Occasionally the members of the local councils of defense, 
which are sometimes appointed by and usually have a direct 
relation to the state council of defense, are members of the war 
chest governing body. In several instances all the officials of 

11 



the local council of defense and of the war chest are identical. 
In general, however, apparently because of the fact that not all 
the states are thoroughly organized and because of the fact 
that relatively few state councils have taken any position in 
the matter, there is no relation between the war chests and the 
state councils of defense. So far as Connecticut is concerned, 
it is perfectly obvious that the war chest wherever established 
should be very carefully integrated with the War Bureau and 
through that with the state council of defense. 



Productivity. 

The war chest produces money. There has been a great 
deal of dispute as to whether the war chest or the drive system 
produces more money. There can be no logically conclusive 
decision among the disputants in this matter. It is not enough 
to show that war chest cities raised more money this year than 
last year, because cities which have not adopted the war chest 
have also raised more money this year. Nor does the compar- 
ative percentage of increase give us an absolutely safe guide, 
because in any given instance it is governed by a number of 
factors whose influence cannot be analyzed accurately. On the 
other hand, it would not be enough for the Red Cross to show 
that they have actually received less or a smaller percentage of 
increase from war chest cities than from cities without the war 
chest. Such statistics would serve merely as an index to the 
practice of some war chest cities in relation to the policy of 
over-subscription of quotas. Moreover the figures would need 
closer analysis to determine whether the war chests involved 
make separate appropriation for the local chapter of the Red 
Cross, and whether they propose to distribute any surplus at 
the close of the fiscal year. Many other factors also enter into 
the problem and complicate it so thoroughly that it defies ef- 
fective analysis. 

It is really astonishing that, in view of the tremendous 
variety of methods employed, there should be such uniformity 
of results as does actually exist. Some war chests had no drive 
at all but simply called for volunteers to come forward and 
subscribe. Some limited themselves to mail solicitations, some 
conducted their whole campaign in one day, some campaigned 
for a month. Despite these remarkable differences in practice, 
only six that reported fell below the goal which was set and in 
some of these cases it is demonstrable that enthusiasm outran 
judgment in setting the goal. 

Many of the cities which reported did not report completely, 
or did not report clearly, and have, in consequence, been omit- 
ted. The best that it has been possible to do in a statistical 

12 



way, therefore, was to take the material from about sixty cities, 
whose figures were clear and dependable. They cover all types 
from metropolitan areas like Philadelphia and vicinity, to vil- 
lages of less than five hundred inhabitants. They are scattered 
from Georgia and Maine on the east to New Mexico, California 
and Montana on the west. As nearly as any group could, they 
seem to be a fair cross-section sample of the United States. 
Some are admitted failures, others striking successes and there 
has been absolutely no "loading." These cities reveal an ave- 
rage gift of $22.07 for every subscriber, and an average 
per capita gift of $8.68, and something over 35% of the 
population enrolled as givers. Lexington, Mass., Rochester and 
Rome, N. Y., lead in size of the average gift, each with $40.00 
or more. The lowest average gift is Vevay with $6.60. The 
highest per capita gift is in Rochester with $19.40 and the low- 
est in Albion with $2.18. The largest per cent, of population 
is in Albany with 58% of the population enrolled as subscrib- 
ers, and the lowest reporting is Albion with 13%. It ought to 
be said that the statistics with regard to the average gift and 
percentage of population have been vitiated by the fact that 
some included children and other persons without independent 
income in their lists of subscribers, others did not, the natural 
result being that those which did include children had a lower 
average gift and a higher percentage of population. 

The really significant figure is that with regard to the per 
capita gift. If it were applied to the whole United States, a not 
unfair process if these cities are as near a normal sample as 
they appear to be, the result would be a national gift of $868,- 
000,000. Last year not one-half that was raised. The antic- 
ipation for this year may fairly be said to be not much over 
$500,000,000. 

At all events it seems that there is developing a consensus 
of opinion that the war chest will produce funds enough. A 
letter from Mr. S. M. Greer, assistant general manager of the 
American Red Cross, says, in speaking of the comparative pro- 
ductive power "the fact that stands out is that any method 
which appeals to the American people will obtain a generous 
response," and again, "it would seem, then, that for proper 
purposes the money can be had in either case." 

The conclusion derived from a sincere effort to get at the 
actual facts in the matter is that the war chest produces at 
least as much money as the drive system in any given community 
and probably produces a very considerable amount more. It 
ought to be said that that statement is extraordinarily conser- 
vative and is made so because of realization of the impossibility 
of complete logical demonstration. The impression which the 
study leads to is that the war chest is a very much better pro- 
ductive agent than the individual drive. 

13 



Dates and Number of War Chests. 

There are no accurate statistics on- the number of war 
chests. This is due partly to the fact that there has been no 
central agency to which they all report, partly because a number 
of communities sometimes join in one war chest and fail to 
make the matter wholly clear, and partly because so many dif- 
ferent names have been used and so many varieties of the 
scheme utilized that letters sent to the president of the war 
chest association fail to reach the person in authority under the 
plan adopted in a given locality, by whatever title he may be 
called. Consequently, accuracy with regard to the number and 
the dates of war chests cannot be had and the statement here 
is admittedly inadequate though it is probably the most complete 
and accurate there is. It is safe to say that there are over 
three hundred war chest communities in the United States. 
The first war chest associations were organized in Syracuse 
and in the towns of Ilion and Mohawk acting together. Which 
of these was first, I do not know ; both were put in operation in 
June, 1917. That at Syracuse has been a pronounced success. 
The Ilion and Mohawk association is not as strikingly successful, 
but should not be called by any means a failure. The next war 
chests which have reported are Kenosha, Wisconsin, and Gran- 
ville, N. Y., which were put in operation in November, 1917. 
There follow in January, 1918, Herkimer, N. Y., and Elkhart, 
Indiana, and in February Columbus, Ohio, Utica, N. Y., Albur- 
querque. New Mexico, Escanaba, Michigan, Oswego, N. Y. 
Before the Red Cross drive opened on the 20th of May there 
had been forty-five war chests established which have reported 
their dates. Forty-four more specifically state that they were 
put in operation at the time of the Red Cross campaign in May, 
1918. Eleven have reported their organization since then and 
the volume of correspondence which has developed indicates that 
large numbers are preparing to organize for operations this 
fall. 

On the whole, it seems fair to say that there has been 
created a sufficient body of experience to be of large value. 
The plan has been in existence more than a year. One of the 
cities has had a second campaign, the results being such an 
extraordinary increase over the first that the community was 
thoroughly satisfied. The better methods of conducting a cam- 
paign can certainly be drawn from experience ; various methods 
of collecting are already proving their several values ; the prob- 
lem of disbursement has been handled so variously that it is 
possible to get a good deal of information along that line. 

Taking it all in all, it seems safe to say that the war chest 
has passed beyond the experimental stage and can now be more 
or less standardized and regularized. If every community is 
careful to put itself in possession of the experience of others in 

14 



almost any particular line, it will have available a considerable 
body of experience to give an idea of the wisest methods to 
follow. By associating themselves with a national organiza- 
tion for the interchange of experience and information, cities 
will avoid the hard necessity of learning exclusively by their 
own mistakes and can profit very largely by the experience of 
others. 

Duration of War Chest Pledges. 

The pledges taken under the war chest plan vary widely in 
the period of time for which they are effective. The original 
plan followed in Syracuse, N. Y., in the campaign of June, 
1917, was to take pledges for the duration of the war, the idea 
being that people should have just one solicitation and then give 
regularly thereafter. Twenty-eight cities have reported that 
they follow that plan. 

As the war has gone on, however, and the needs of the 
agencies have increased vastly it has become evident that that 
plan has certain difficulties and dangers. These arise partly 
from the unforeseen development of humanitarian and recrea- 
tional work, and partly from the movement of population, the 
moving away of subscribers and the coming of new persons who 
should be given an opportunity to play their part. In conse- 
quence of these considerations and others — inconvenient book- 
keeping and the establishment of a proper system of caring for 
labor turn-over — Syracuse abandoned the original plan and con- 
ducted a new campaign in June, 1918, cancelling all former 
pledges and making the new pledges run for a period of a year. 
Careful inquiry among different classes of population developed 
the fact that this was not regarded by the public in any way 
as a breach of faith, because it recognized the situation. The 
fact that the alteration in plan did not develop friction is also 
evidenced by the fact that the number of subscribers was much 
more than doubled and the amount of the subscriptions was at 
least doubled. 

The present scheme in use at Syracuse constitutes the sec- 
ond general plan with regard to the duration of pledges. Thir- 
ty-nine towns have reported that they take pledges for a period 
of one year. Six allow the subscriber an option between signing 
for one year or for the duration of the war. 

There are other plans. A few cities have adopted the 
method of Mitchell, S. D., namely, to have pledges not for the 
duration of the war, but for the period during which war relief 
is necessary, which may be of much longer duration than the 
war.^ Billings, Mont., took pledges for the duration of the War 
Service League. These plans are open to the same objections 
to which pledges for the duration of the war are open, and are 
not wise plans to follow. 

Kenosha, Wis., and Lansing, Mich., and certain other cities 
have set odd periods of time, such as thirteen months or ten 

15 



months, for the duration of their pledges, apparently in order 
to bring the beginning of the fiscal year at what was deemed to 
be a convenient time, 

Cleveland, Ohio, originated the idea of having pledges for 
six months, the purpose being to have two drives a year. In 
its first campaign in May, 1918, pledges were taken for a period 
of seven months in order to make the fiscal year begin with 
the calendar year. This plan is advocated strongly in Cleve- 
land on the ground that it facilitates the operation of the budget 
principle in making disbursements as against the necessity for 
having disbursements made by a committee after the amount 
has been raised. Those in charge of the war chest there felt 
that by attempting to look forward only six months a budget 
was possible, whereas it would not be advisable if a whole year 
was to be covered. This unquestionably gives an element of 
flexibility to the budget method of disbursement. The leaders 
in Cleveland feel also that this plan meets the argument, wheth- 
er sound or not, that the public needs constant re-information 
by means of drives. It ought to be said under the operation of 
this idea it is understood that any over-subscription of the 
amount demanded by the budget shall be applied to the ensu- 
ing fiscal period, ^. e., they do not propose to over-subscribe the 
amounts called for by their budget and to spend all the money 
collected within this fiscal period. The reason for this is that 
they feel that it would be doing a moral injustice to the sub- 
scribers who ought to do their proper part in making payments 
toward these organizations, but no more. Many, if not most, 
of the cities which have adopted a year as the period for the 
duration of their pledges are perfectly candid in saying that if 
the amount which is collected proves insufficient to meet the 
requirements of the Red Cross and the other organizations there 
will be no hesitancy in approaching the public for more funds. 
Many war chests have published a statement to that effect. 
For example, Springfield, Mass., published the following state- 
ment, prepared by Mr. Charles Hall : 

"It is impossible at this time to determine accurately what is 
going to be required by war relief organizations for the next twelve 
months, but based on such information as is available and after tak- 
ing into account that the activities of all these organizations are in- 
creasing by leaps and bounds, the trustees feel safe in stating that if 
$1,200,000 is obtained from the war chest territory it will take care 
of demands to be made upon us for the next twelve months." 

The guarantee is not that there will be no other war chest 
canvass within a year, but that no other organization save the 
war chest can make a canvass within one year. 

Roanoke, Va., was explicit in saying that the pledges were 
to cover one year "unless dire necessity made the demands such 
that the war chest would be insufficient." Detroit published 

16 



a statement which said that "by the terms of agreement with 
the patriotic fund the subscriber is protected for one year from 
further soHcitation except in case of possible national emergen- 
cies that may arise." The statement in Newberry read that they 
would sanction "no other requests for subscriptions for contri- 
butions for patriotic purposes except in case the funds should 
prove inadequate to care for the demands made upon the 
county." 

These quotations may be taken as sample statements and 
represent what appears to be a safe and proper method of hand- 
ling the situation, namely, to make the duration of pledges only 
presumptively one year but to give no guarantee that the war 
chest will not return within that period if calamities should lead 
to a situation where its funds should prove inadequate. This 
practice is not, as has sometimes been said, a substantial return 
to the drive system, because such an emergency, as it relates to 
the war chest, would come only as a result of an emergency call 
from the Red Cross or one of the other organizations. A disas- 
ter of large proportions would be likely to involve at least the 
Y, M. C, A. in addition to the Red Cross. In that case commu- 
nities would be faced with a whole group of emergency drives, 
whereas many war chests would not have to campaign at all 
because of the size of their emergency funds and such cities as 
did have to make an appeal would have only one and not several 
as a result of the emergency. 

It is clear that it is unwise to set a fixed time before which 
the war chest agrees not to approach the public for further 
funds. The correlative problem is whether the war chest 
should set a fixed time at which it will come back to the public 
for funds even though the needs of the various agencies have 
not yet exhausted the resources of the chest. There are four 
types of practice in relation to this. 

First of all, certain cities, notably Rochester and Detroit, 
which are mentioned simply as prominent examples, plan to dis- 
burse the entire amount of the funds collected within the period 
of a year. This means a large over-subscription to practically 
every participating cause. All things considered, this seems 
to me to be the best method while war auxiliary agencies con- 
tinue to finance their work as at present without attempting 
to make real budgets. 

The second method, one which appears to be unique, is used 
by the Montgomery County War Chest with headquarters at 
Crawfordsville, Indiana, The plan allows the committee which 
controls the fund to designate any particular month or months 
when payments shall be omitted, if it is confident that without 
such payments there will still be sufficient money to meet de- 
mands of the causes to which the war chest contributes. Inas- 
much as all pledges are payable monthly the omission of any 
payment affects all subscribers equally. 

17 



The third method is to carry over the amount which is not 
absorbed in meeting quotas and reduce by that much the call 
at the next campaign. 

The fourth plan, that to be used in several Ohio cities as 
well as certain others, is to postpone the time of the next drive 
until more money is needed to meet the quotas assigned to the 
community which may be thirteen or fifteen or more months. 

The last three of these plans are obviously built upon the 
assumption that the war chest will not over-subscribe its quotas 
for the various agencies. In response to the objection that 
these methods are likely to lull the constituency to sleep and to 
make the public feel that there is no need for real sacrificial 
effort, the answer is made that nothing conduces to such confi- 
dence on the part of the giving public in the wisdom and pru- 
dence of the disbursement agents as to have the administration 
of the funds put on one of these basis. The argument runs as 
follows : 

"We look ahead and see, let us say, a need for $100,000 to meet 
the probable demands and also the improbable calls which emergency 
may bring. By urging the people to give to the limit in view of pos- 
sible disaster they produce, let us say, $200,000. Now if we expend 
the whole of that $200,000 without the arising of a national emergency 
it means that we have called 'wolf like the shepherd boy of the fable, 
and then deceived them. When on the other hand we conserve that 
money by not over-subscribing it does not cripple the national organ- 
izations, since they get all they ask for and whenever they need more 
they are always free to ask for it. These methods create tremendous 
confidence on the part of the public in the trustworthiness and candor 
of those to whom they have committed the administration of their 
gifts. If you warn the public," the argument continues, "that you may 
return with a new demand for funds within twelve months you make 
your terminal point movable. If you move it one way in the face of 
emergency demand it is only fair that you S'hould move it in the other 
direction if the demands are such that it is possible to do so." 

Unquestionably this logic has some force, and if the war 
relief agencies were regulated by a Federal commission and had 
real budgets, it would be the proper practice. So long, however, 
as present methods prevail a due regard for the wishes of the 
agencies, whose interests after all the war chest ought assidu- 
ously to serve, demands that the policy of over-subscription be 
adopted. At present all of these agencies use the over-sub- 
scription not merely for the enlargement of their work but also 
for the extension of the time between their appeals for funds. 
It is obvious therefore that when one of these agencies collected 
precisely the amount of its quota demands it would return for 
more in ten months, but when it collected an amount in excess 
of exact quota assignments it would postpone its return for 
more funds until twelve months had elapsed, there is a period 

18 



of two months out of that year in which cities which paid only 
the face of their quotas are not contributing to its support but 
are leaving that wholly to such cities as over-subscribed. This 
is not a theoretical argument. Last year the Y. M. C. A. called 
for $35,000,000, which was to finance its work until July. The 
over-subscription allows it to postpone its call to the public a 
number of months. During those months the cities which gave 
only the exact amounts of their quotas are not contributing to 
its support. 

The only reason in the light of these facts for refusing 
over-subscriptions is that it it is a justifiable means of bringing 
pressure upon the war auxiliary agencies for reform. While 
there is some evidence that it is not a wholly ineffective method 
it seems on the whole wiser to use other means. It ought to be 
said in fairness that this is an individual judgment and must be 
construed, therefore, not as a criticism of the action of the war 
chests which follow the practice of refusing to over-subscribe, 
but simply expresses a difference of opinion. The war chests 
are not the only agencies which follow this plan. The Mercer 
County plan, which has gained considerable currency, is built 
upon refusal to over-subscribe quotas; the Washington State 
Council of Defense in its Bulletin 114 practically prohibits over- 
subscription of quotas to any cause. In short, most of the local 
and state attempts to work reform in present methods of financ- 
ing these agencies are based upon refusal to over-subscribe. 
Elsewhere in this report it is pointed out that the writer agrees 
with the principle but feels that further opportunity should 
first be given the agencies themselves to alter their present 
methods. 

INCLUSIVENESS. 

The policy with regard to the territorial extent of war 
chests has not become standardized. Occasionally it follows the 
Red Cross chapter organization or the organization of the state 
under the council of defense for war purposes. In general the 
normal political entities govern this policy. Thus, in states 
where the county plays a significant part in political life, the 
war chest is likely to be county-wide in extent. In Wisconsin 
and Ohio, for example, practically all the war chests include 
entire counties. In New England, on the other hand, where the 
city or township is the unit of political life, relatively few war 
chests include whole counties. Occasionally in some great met- 
ropolitan area as, for example, Philadelphia the war chest 
covers more than one county. In that case it includes five. 

As applied to Connecticut the wise principle appears to be 
to base the inclusiveness on four considerations: first, the or- 
ganization of the State under the Council of Defense; second, 
the organization of the Red Cross chapters; third, the embrac- 
ing of surburbs which furnish large numbers to industrial cen- 
ters, so that those who commute will not be solicited in two 

19 



places and so that they may be reached primarily through their 
places of employment, which proves to be the most effective 
manner of reaching people; and, fourth, the matter of covering 
the ground without leaving stray bits of territory which would 
be difficult to organize separately. 

There is, unquestionably, some prejudice against including 
rural districts in a city war chest, because for one reason or 
other the country districts have not the same giving capacity as 
urban centers. Cities are usually eager to make a record and 
hesitate to include districts which may not produce large 
amounts and which will have a tendency in consequence to lower 
the standard of pledge and limit productive power. This, how- 
ever, is a factor which should not be allowed to enter seriously 
into the question because of the larger and more important 
issues involved. 

Agencies Included. 

It is impossible to discover an absolute standard with 
regard to how many or what agencies are allowed to participate. 
This is not at all surprising when one considers the number of 
organizations approaching the public with appeals for funds and 
when one realizes that there is no rational method of endorse- 
ment for them. The only agency endorsed by the Council of 
National Defense is the Red Cross. The six agencies which 
operate under the Fosdick Commission are endorsed by that 
body, which is an agent of the War and Navy Departments but 
strangely enough are not given endorsement by the Council of 
National Defense. There is beside these the Salvation Army, 
which, if Mr. Fosdick is accurately quoted in the New York 
Times, "is recognized by the American Expeditionary Force," 
though not by the Fosdick Commission itself — surely an anoma- 
lous situation. There are in addition agencies which on the one 
hand receive funds from the Red Cross — for example, the Arme- 
nian and Syrian Relief — and which are thus stamped with its 
approval, and others with contribute to the Red Cross, as the 
American, Belgian, French, British Blind Fund. There are 
still others which in their appeals carry letters of endorsement 
from government officials, perhaps acting personally though 
that is seldom emphasized. There are yet others M^hich have 
been examined as to their business methods, though not as to the 
question of whether they are duplicative or not, by the Charity 
Organization Society of New York and still others which are 
complete free lances. In a situation as chaotic as that it is not 
surprising that there is no standard practice. 

In this matter one should preserve a comparative point of 
view. It is not proper to criticise war chests in general because 
some of them support causes of questionable value or even ques- 
tionable practice, for those causes also derive money from cities 
where there are no war chests — and with greater impunity. In 

20 



general the war chests command larger investigative power and 
almost uniformly make more serious attempts to discover the 
proper line of action. The consequence is that the war chest 
movement has a very distinct tendency to diminish the support 
of unworthy and duplicative agencies. This tendency will un- 
doubtedly be largely stimulated by the organization of a Nation- 
al Association of War Chests which is mentioned in another 
part of this report. 

The most common practice is to name in the literature the 
larger organizations, beginning with the Red Cross, the six 
Fosdick agencies, and usually the Armenian and Syrian Relief, 
and then to add the statement that the chest will also lend 
support to any other organizations which the trustees may de- 
cide are worthy. This may lead to contributions to an almost 
innumerable number of causes. Syracuse, N. Y., last year gave 
some money to fifty-four causes. In the three months, April, 
May, and June of this year Columbus appropriated for thirty 
causes. In six months Kenosha, Wis., gave to twenty-three 
causes. Even leaving out of account the many local agencies 
and the support granted to war savings and Liberty bond cam- 
paign committees for advertising and other expenses, the total 
number is large, though by no means so large as that in cities 
which have no war chests. 

The number of agencies in the field and the differences in 
the degree of endorsement which has been accorded them have 
led many people to fear that there will be raids upon the large 
aggregations of money gathered in war chest cities. To meet 
this danger there has been organized on the one hand the 
National Association already mentioned and there have been 
developed in some cities checks upon the number of agencies. 
For example, Springfield, Mass., has a provision in its by-laws 
by which there are recognized the Red Cross, the Y. M. C. A., 
K. of C, and the Jewish Welfare League, to which appropria- 
tions can be made on vote of the majority of the board of trus- 
tees, and they may contribute "to such other organizations and 
agencies recognized by the Government of the United States 
as are engaged in general war relief work upon the affirmative 
votes of three-fourths of the full board of trustees. In cases 
of emergency, distress, or necessity for immediate relief, the 
trustees shall have power to appropriate and expend funds for 
the same upon the affirmative votes of three-fourths of the full 
board of trustees." Other cities have included, occasionally, sim- 
ilar provisions requiring an extraordinary majority in order to 
give to other than a few stated agencies. 

On the whole it seems to me that the situation is such at 
the present time that the Government is not likely to call new 
agencies into the field and that the probabilities of the develop- 
ment of new causes of worthy character and large importance 
are slender. It seems therefore that the proper policy to be 

21 



pursued henceforth is to require the budget committee to survey 
the field carefully, to call upon all who wish to participate to 
make that fact known, and then to select those which shall share 
in the fund and publish their names in advance. There should 
be no question of the inclusion of the agencies recognized by 
the Council of National Defense or of the War Department, but 
beyond that point a good deal of discretion would be requisite. 
This plan would preclude absolutely the danger of raids upon the 
fund. 

This is perhaps the place where some careful consideration 
should be given to the question as to the relations between the 
Red Cross and the war chest. The Red Cross is selected because 
it is the most prominent of the agencies and because it is the 
only one which has conducted a drive since the war chest move- 
ment became general. 

The whole problem of the attitude of the Red Cross toward 
the war chest movement and the results of the war chest upon 
the Red Cross is one of extraordinary difficulty because of the 
fact that the factors which are regarded as most important by 
the Red Cross officials cannot be dealt with statistically. The 
objection of Red Cross officials to the war chest movement 
springs from fear lest the esprit de corps of the organization 
might be impaired and an alien factor might be introduced 
between the Red Cross and the people. 

It seems to be unquestionably true, both from personal ob- 
servation and in view of statements of Red Cross officials, that 
the war chest movement has cut down the amount of support 
of the Red Cross in some communities. The total effect it has 
been impossible to determine. Indeed figures which the Red 
Cross officials were kind enough to show me in a confidential 
way make it evident that it is not yet possible for the Red Cross 
itself to reach a final conclusion in the matter. 

The reasons for the cut-down in some communities are in- 
volved. It is due in the first place to a widespread impression 
that the Red Cross has a budget. Whether or not it has what 
may be called a budget is not readily determinable, since one 
official gave complete assurance that there was absolutely none 
and another one says : "After our budget had been determined as 
nearly as was practicable," etc., which would indicate that there 
was some sort of budget. At all events strange ideas are 
abroad about this matter, one city being under the impression 
that the War Department fixed the amount for which the Red 
Cross was to call and also local quotas! It has been impossible 
further to determine whether the Red Cross quotas amounted 
to $100,000,000 in the aggregate or to more than that amount. 
High Red Cross officials said they thought it amounted to more, 
but repeated efforts to discover exactly what the facts are have 
been unavailing. Moreover the basis of determining the quotas 
is not entirely clear. It is described thus by one official: 

22 



"Our method in determining the quotas is to make use of aH 
existing statistics of population and wealth and examine all the quotas 
and responses of communities to Liberty Loan and Thrift Stamp cam- 
paigns. In addition we load our figures under local advice where 
there are peculiar elements of population and prosperity to consider. 
By 'loading' I mean that special figures are given weight in addition 
to the general figures." 

Whether it is true or not the impression is common among 
war chest cities that one of the elements of "loading" is whether 
or not there is a war chest. In some of the cities of New York 
State the impression was deeply grounded that there had been 
discrimination in the matter of quotas against war chest cities. 

The result, it seems to me, is that the whole matter is con- 
fused largely through misunderstandings. There is undoubted- 
ly on the one hand serious misunderstanding on the part of some 
Red Cross officials with regard to the nature of the war chest 
movement, and there is a misunderstanding on the other hand 
among some war chest cities as to the nature and methods of 
financing the Red Cross. The difficulty is not due to any lack 
of desire on the part of the communities to do their utmost 
share in the support of America's greatest humanitarian effort, 
but it is not surprising that they should lack understanding of 
some of the points involved in view of the difficulty of getting 
precise official information. 

Many cities on the other hand have exceeded their quotas. 
Mr. Davison in a telegram to Mr. James R. Garfield, Lakes 
Division Manager, stated that "a number of cities where war 
chest drives were held have doubled their Red Cross quotas," 
and at the same time called upon those war chest cities which 
had not exceeded their quotas to over-subscribe to the extent of 
sixty-five per cent, on the ground that it was the only way in 
which they could do their full share, inasmuch as the Red Cross 
was not being financed by the drive for any stated period — so 
that the larger the amount raised the longer a new drive would 
be deferred. As indicated elsewhere in this report, it seems to 
me that under present conditions this is the proper practice for 
cities to follow. 

The results of personal observation cover the following 
cities : 

Salem, Mass., was given a quota of $40,000. The first ap- 
propriation from the war chest was $50,000 for the Red Cross, 
which was not necessarily regarded as final. 

Lexington, Mass., was assigned a quota of $8,500, which 
was more than double that of last year. Last year its contribu- 
tion was not over $5,000 ; the war chest has appropriated $17,- 
000. That is double this year's quota, quadruple last year's, and 
triple last year's gift. 

Seymour, Conn., appropriated $25,000, where last year the 

23 



drive produced $30,000. It was said there was special reason 
for this, and it may be that the appropriation will be increased 
later, though there is no information on that topic. 

Toledo, Ohio, last year gave $750,000 on a quota of $450,- 
000. This year the quota was advanced to $600,000, but on 
objection was reduced to $450,000. That amount was appro- 
priated. In addition the war chest will take care of the local 
Red Cross chapter to an amount which is estimated to be from 
$350,000 to $400,000, whereas last year the chapter had only its 
twenty-five per cent, of $750,000. This means, therefore, that 
Toledo is spending more money for Red Cross purposes than 
last year. 

In Columbus, Ohio, the Red Cross called for $300,000 and 
that amount was appropriated. In addition, however, the local 
chapter is receiving about $20,000 a month, which may be more 
or less according to current needs. The Red Cross will get 
more for all purposes than it did last year. There was some 
fear in Columbus that the war chest might put a damper upon 
the local work of the chapter, but this has not proved to be the 
case. 

Dayton, Ohio, last year subscribed $221,876.12. There was 
collected $214,053.02, the unpaid subscriptions amounting to 
$7,823.10. Campaign expenses, for local purposes only, 
amounted to $4,211.57 and the expense of collection to $1,592.45, 
making a total expense account of $5,804.02. The net amount 
which the Red Cross received last year therefore was $208,- 
249.10. Twenty-five per cent, of that amount proved insuffi- 
cient for the work of the local chapter. This year the war 
chest appropriated to the War Fund of the Red Cross $200,000 
and to the local chapter $40,000, which means a larger total for 
Red Cross purposes than last year. 

Detroit, Mich., last year had a quota of $1,500,000 and 
raised $2,250,000, an over-subscription of $750,000. The local 
chapter had twenty-five per cent, of this amount. This y^ar 
Detroit had the same quota and gave that amount outright, 
none being retained for the local chapter. That amounts to an 
over-subscription of twenty-five per cent. Besides, the plan calls 
for participation of the war agencies pro rata in the over-sub- 
scription of the war chest goal after costs, shrinkage, etc., have 
been determined. Thus the National Red Cross will get from 
$1,000,000 to $1,500,000 more than last year and in addition 
the local chapter is to have $1,500,000. Detroit, therefore, is 
devoting a great deal more to Red Cross purposes this year than 
last. 

In Hudson Falls, N. Y., it was agreed that one-sixth of all 
that was raised in addition to the minimum amount called for 
by the war chest should be given to the Red Cross in addition 
to its quota. Under this plan the Red Cross secured more than 
a one hundred per cent, over-subscription. 

24 



Rochester, N. Y., incorporated in its budget a provision for 
an over-subscription which will net the Red Cross an amount 
largely in excess of that which was available last year. 

Utica, N, Y., had a quota last year of $160,000, which was 
later reduced to $100,000, $90,000 being raised. This year the 
quota was increased to $250,000, v/hich was met. Thus the 
Red Cross War Fund got nearly three times as much this year 
as last. In addition' they plan to support the local Red Cross 
chapter for an amount which may reach $150,000 and will be a 
net addition to what Utica did for the Red Cross last year. 

Springfield, Mass., last year had a quota of $200,000 and 
raised $342,000. This year its quota was increased to $300»- 
000, which was appropriated. In addition the war chest sup- 
ports the local Red Cross in an amount estimated at about $200,- 
000. The total appropriations for Red Cross purposes will 
therefore be in excess of last year. 

Rome and Syracuse, N. Y,, have both had their quotas in- 
creased from approximately $2.00 per capita to $3.00 per capita 
and gave in accordance. 

Cleveland, Ohio, met its quota and made no separate pro- 
vision for the local chapter. How its subscription compares 
with last year I do not know. 

The Miami, Ohio, war chest gave 132% of its quota in order 
to conform to the general over-subscription of quotas in the 
Lakes Division. 

Youngstown, Ohio, simply met its quota and in consequence 
gave less to the Red Cross War Fund than last year. The war 
chest will take care of the local Red Cross chapter, but even so 
there is some doubt as to whether there will be as much money 
devoted to Red Cross purposes from that city this year as last. 

Philadelphia, Pa., recognizing the force of the argument 
about over-subscription, miade an extra appropriation which 
amounted to an over-subscription in about the same proportion 
as was the case in other communities of its size. 

What the result of new method of apportioning production 
to the local chapters will be it is not yet possible to determine. 
If this relieves them of a financial burden which is not promptly 
replaced by the demands due to the development of the Home 
Service, . it may be that some cities will alter their practice. 
The cities mentioned above are simply a haphazard collection 
and were not selected on any principle whatever. They furnish 
perhaps a fair sample of war chest practice. 

Occasionally it is said that local chapters are embarrassed 
under the war chest plan. Indeed local Red Cross officials in 
one or two divisions have written to that effect. An effort to 
check up this statement by referring through correspondence 
to several officials of local chapters has brought vigorous de- 
nials. In almost every city visited an effort was made to see 
personally the Red Cross chapter officials and talk over the 

25 



matter confidentially. Not more than one or two wished a 
return to the old practice. A few of them admitted some em- 
barrassment because of the necessity of turning in budgets to 
a war chest disbursement committee. The great majority, on 
the other hand, expressed themselves as being very much pleas- 
ed with the situation and as being relieved of one of their most 
serious burdens, inasmuch as war chests made it possible for 
them to devote their energies to the industrial production and 
development of Home Service without diversion of effort in 
the direction of raising money. None reported any loss in in- 
terest or slackening in work. 

The conclusion of this matter, if put bluntly, would be 
that no candid investigator could fail to become convinced that 
the war chests are unanimously determined to support the Red 
Cross in any effort it may undertake and on the other hand, 
that the Red Cross, so far as its higher officials, at least, are 
concerned, has attempted to cooperate with the war chest cities 
but found itself embarrassed by the introduction into a broad 
general scheme of a new and unexpected element. As time goes 
on the situation is certain to clear. The policy of intimate in- 
formation and frank contact will eliminate most of the troubles. 

The Red Cross, however, has never entertained any fear 
that the war chest plan would destroy the financial support of 
the Red Cross if generally adopted. They regard the matter as 
going deeper than the mere garnering of money and have some 
fears lest their broad plan of building a comprehensive national 
organization on the broadest lines might be interfered with. 
They have laid out an elaborate and what one of their officials 
frankly called an idealistic scheme which they fear the war 
chest may have a tendency to disrupt. It is not possible in the 
space available to deal with this phase of the situation. In any 
event no definitive conclusion could be set forth for the prob- 
lem is one of opinion. After careful study of the question the 
writer has come to believe that the war chest has not proved 
and is not likely to prove a serious interference with the Red 
Cross program. Whatever modification may have to be made 
in the scheme of things outlined by the Red Cross will rise from 
causes which produced the war chest movement and for which 
the war chest is, therefore, not responsible. 

Red Cross Membership. 

The problem of Red Cross membership has become in some 
instances more or less acute. Here again careful inquiry de- 
velops the fact that friction is occasioned almost entirely by the 
failure to understand each others' point of view rather than by 
any desire on the part of the Red Cross to be captious or any 
wish on the part of the war chest cities to flout the Red Cross. 

The original idea current among war chest cities was that 
the Red Cross would welcome having enrolled as members the 

26 



large number of people who were subscribers to the war chest, 
a not unnatural notion, since the contributors to the first Red 
Cross War Fund were enrolled as members and the war chests 
contributed to that fund. Therefore Syracuse and other cities 
provided for an automatic membership and simply took out a 
dollar membership for every war chest subscriber. It , devel- 
oped however that the Red Cross objected to automatic mem- 
berships on the ground that joining the organization should be 
an expression of personal interest rather than a financial mat- 
ter. The Red Cross wished to have the membership help to 
maintain personal contact between individuals and itself. 

After the attitude of the Red Cross became known various 
plans were devised to obviate the trouble. Syracuse, for ex- 
ample, at the time of its second war chest .drive had the solicitor 
after taking a w^ar chest subscription offer the subscriber an 
application for membership in the Red Cross, to be paid from 
war chest funds. This amounted of course to a designation of 
one dollar of the contribution for the purpose of Red Cross 
membership. The second method has been to incorporate in 
the pledge to the war chest a statement that the first dollar paid 
should be used for membership in he American Red Cross, a 
statement which could be crossed out by persons not wishing to 
join. The pledge card of Sycamore, Illinois, contained the 
statement that: 

"It is understood that after December 31, 1918, $ per 

year of the amount hereby pledged shall be used in payment of annual 
memberships in the Red Cross for the persons named on the reverse 
side of this card, provided my annual contribution shall be not less 
than $2.00 for each person named." 

What the attitude of the Red Cross toward these methods 
may be is not known. Whether it is insistent that the mem- 
bership drive must come in December or whether communities 
may suit their own convenience about the time of enrolling mem- 
bers is unascertained. 

Two other plans have been developed, hoM^ever, both of 
which provide for a December enrollment. The first of these 
excludes the Red Cross membership entirely from the war chest 
and allows the Red Cross to stage a wholly independent drive at 
that time on the ground that it is not a matter of money, but 
a matter entirely of membership, and that the money is a purely 
incidental concomitant. This plan was adopted in Dayton, 
Ohio, E4mira, N. Y., Glens Falls, N. Y., Tarrytown, N. Y., 
Springfield, Mass., Vevay, Indiana, and perhaps others. It has 
the weakness that it does not wholly keep the pledge with regard 
to prohibiting all other solicitations for money. While a dollar 
is a very small amount for many people, to the industrial worker 
who is making sacrificial subscription on a weekly or monthly 
basis it may be not inconsiderable. 

27 



In consequence there has been developed the plan contem- 
plated in Utica by which all war chest members will be sent a 
non-transferable coupon, good for a one-dollar membership in 
the Red Cross. The Red Cross can then stage its membership 
drive and subscribers can either turn in the coupon for an 
annual membership or put more inoney with it according to 
the class of membership they desire. They may destroy the 
coupon and join by paying money, or they may decline to join 
and destroy the coupon. This plan seems on the whole to be an 
admirable one. It preserves the personal contact which the 
Red Cross desires to maintain. At the same time it allows the 
person to plan at one time his giving for the entire year and 
since the money is not regarded by the Red Cross as the vital 
factor its passage through the war chest is scarcely an objection. 

The war chest in every case should be particularly careful 
to see to it that it provides a plan in this matter which is 
satisfactory to the Red Cross. 

Local Charities. 

A minority only, it is safe to say, are taking care of local 
charities by means of the war chest. Of those reporting on this 
point, fifty-six do not, twelve do, and eight made responses that 
leave one in doubt. 

The reasons for including them are, first of all, the fact 
that it emphasizes the single campaign idea and in some cities, 
as for example in Dayton, Ohio, after the war chest idea began 
to spread to the public, there was a demand that the charities 
should be included. The second reason is that these local char- 
ities have a tendency in the press of war financing and the sup- 
porting of war relief agencies to run into debt, both because of 
increased cost of operation and decreased support due to com- 
petition with war funds. Their unfortunate financial condi- 
tions are often therefore traceable directly to the war. It seems 
unfortunate that permanent institutions should be burdened 
with debt, V\^hich would tend to cripple their effectiveness later. 
In the third place, many of these are engaged in war work to 
some extent. In addition to the activity of the home service 
department of the Red Cross, many charitable organizations 
find that the war develops greater demands upon them and 
many hospitals anticipate a good deal of war work. Finally, 
local charities have been included in some cases with the specific 
end in view of educating the public. In such cases it has been 
done as part of a deliberate effort to break down prejudices, 
cliques, and create a broader community spirit. In one parti- 
cular instance where it was admitted that the inclusion of local 
charities had probably reduced the amount of money raised, the 
men in charge believed that it was worth the price because it 
had cleared up an absurd situation and opened the way for bet- 
ter things another year. 

28 



Where local agencies are included, the support accorded 
them varies widely, both in extent and character. Some cities, 
as for example Rochester, include the local Y. M. C. A. in the 
war chest. Others include only purely charitable enterprises. 
In Detroit forty-two local organizations were included ; in Roch- 
ester thirty-six. Cleveland has a welfare federation which in- 
cludes about ninety societies of which only sixty participate in 
the funds. The welfare federation was included in the war 
chest. These facts give some rough notion of the varieties 
and number of causes supported in different communities. 

There is the same difference in the character of the support 
which is given. For example, the Rochester war chest did not 
take care of the deficits of the societies. The inclusion of local 
agencies was regarded as more or less of an experiment and it 
was decided to see them through this year, leaving them in the 
same financial condition at its close as at the beginning. On 
the other hand, Detroit and certain other cities did take care of 
the deficits, feeling confident that the plan would be continued. 

Some cities forbade the charities which Vv^ere to participate 
to include capital expenditures, allowing only current expenses 
to be put in the budget. Other cities, on the contrary, allowed 
certain capital expenditures to be included. Rochester permits 
any society to solicit funds during the year for capital expendi- 
tures. In Detroit, however, that appears to be regarded as not 
wholly in accord with the spirit of the war chest's operation. 

Most of the cities which provide for their local charities 
give them, not the full amount of their needs, since many derive 
income from endowment or other sources, but allow them to 
receive from the war chest only that part of their expenses for 
which they would have been obliged to solicit the public. 

There are certain difficulties and dangers involved in the 
inclusion of local charities. In the first place the fiscal years 
are not uniform and very delicate work is required to obviate 
the difficulties which this introduces. In the second place, ex- 
perience has shown some suspicion and dislike of these among 
certain elements of the public. Occasionally there has been a 
feeling on the part of the wage-earners that these enterprises 
are more or less aristocratic in character, adopting a somewhat 
superior attitude towards those from whom they do not derive 
support. This fact unquestionably caused friction in a number 
of cities. In some of them criticisms were justifiable and it 
Was pointed out to the charitable organizations that inasmuch 
as their support had been democratized, their behavior might 
well undergo alteration in the same direction, and it is said that 
this had a salutary effect. 

In the third place the inclusion of the local charities has 
a tendency to raise religious and sectarian questions. This is 
particularly true when it happens that a hospital of one religious 
denomination is wholly supported by church contributions and 

29 



in consequence is not included in the war chest, while a hospital 
of another denomination has been accustomed to approach the 
general public with an appeal for funds and consequently is 
included in the war chest. 

In the fourth place, the argument frequently used against 
the war chest to the effect that it destroys the clientele of sepa- 
rate organizations has more cogency when applied to local char- 
ities than to war relief funds. Usually these agencies have 
built up a circle of individuals interested personally and finan- 
cially in their success. If they are included in the war chest, 
they are overshadowed by issues so much larger that this clien- 
tele has a tendency to be disintegrated and the personal interest 
upon which they must depend in order to get personal work is 
to some extent destroyed. There is the risk that ''local charities 
after being carried two or three years by a war chest might 
find themselves left by the wayside, should the war chest dis- 
solve after the conclusion of the war. In the case of the smaller 
organizations particularly, their publicity and financial machin- 
ery would be very likely to atrophy during a long period of war 
chest financing. This is, I think, a danger which should be 
guarded against." (Quoted from a letter of Mr. Barry C. 
Smith.) 

Finally, it has been urged that this practice has a tendency 
"to take the war out of war chest", by putting in an appeal 
which cannot be called purely patriotic. 

Such reasons as these doubtless, as well as others, induced 
the Washington State Council of Defense to direct that "cam- 
paigns for the support of institutions not organized primarily 
for war work may not be combined with appeals for war work." 

Arguments for and against the inclusion of local charities 
are so evenly balanced that it seems evident that the wisdom 
of inclusion or exclusion depends very largely upon local con- 
siderations. It depends upon the character of the charities, the 
religious and racial distribution, the present means and methods 
of support, and the amount to which the community has been 
educated in relation to them. Certainly no other feature of a 
war chest requires as much careful diplomacy and thorough 
preparatory work as does the inclusion of local charities. It 
is probably fair to say that, as a general rule, the larger the 
city the more difficult becomes the inclusion and the more 
doubtful the wisdom of including local charities. This, how- 
ever, is a rule that is not absolutely without exception. 

In case inclusion is decided upon, experience has shown, 
first, that more time is necessary to organize ; second, that this 
matter needs particularly frank and candid treatment; third 
that the local agencies should have itemized budgets presented 
to the budget committee and that the amount which they are to 
receive collectively and individually should be published well in 
advance of the campaign — whether the war funds are budgeted 

30 



or not; and fourth, disbursement should be made to them not in 
a lump sum, but monthly, in accordance with their needs under 
the budget. Any committee which considers including local 
charities should read with great care the report on "Financial 
Federations" published by the American Association for Organ- 
izing Charity, 130 East 22nd Street, New York City. 



31 



CHAPTER TWO 



STRUCTURE OF THE WAR CHEST. 

It is not possible within the limits of this report to give 
a complete account of the various types of permanent and cam- 
paign organizations used in various cities where the war chest 
has been adopted. Instead, an effort will be made to give a 
sort of composite picture which describes no particular city's 
plan accurately but which represents, so far as may be possible, 
the consensus of practice. 

Permanent Organization. 

The problem of satisfactorily organizing the permanent 
structure of the war chest and at the same time creating a 
teijiporary campaign organization is one of some difficulty. 

To begin with there is a very acute problem of integration 
— to make such arrangements that there will be neither over- 
lapping nor gaps. Probably the simplest and most effective 
way of meeting this problem is to put the destinies of the v»^ar 
chest in the hands of a relatively small executive committee 
whose members shall be the chairmen of the various other per- 
manent commiittees. In this fashion a relatively small group 
can get together and decide matters of policy. This is virtually 
the plan adopted in Columbus, Ohio, Butte, Montana, and Utica, 
N. Y. This committee should have general charge of the war 
chest and of the disbursement of the funds, ultimate responsi- 
bility being centered in this body. 

Syracuse carried this idea still further and planned not 
only to integrate the work of the war chest committees effec- 
tively but to have an executive committee which represented 
all phases of community war work — Liberty bonds, food, fuel, 
war savings, etc. — and have the same group in charge of vir- 
tually the whole range of civic war activities, the immediate 
sponsor for the particular activity acting as chairman wherever 
his problem was under immediate consideration. As applied to 
Connecticut, this would mean that the war bureau should be the 
executive committee. Whether this is a desirable plan for the 
cities of this state depends upon local considerations. At all 
events it would be unwise, in view of present organization of 
war bureaus, to have the chairmanship movable, as in the plan 
suggested in Syracuse. 

In many cases the executive committee, by whatever name 
known, undertook to run the campaign. More frequently, how- 
ever, that task was assigned to a committee known variously 

32 



as an organization committee, as a membership committee, as a 
teams committee, as a campaign committee, or as a war cabinet. 
The function of this body was defined by Adrian, Michigan, "to 
have charge of organizing the league in every ward and town- 
ship of the county." In Springfield, Mass., the war cabinet was 
given the direction of the drive. 

Ordinarily one member of this committee, usually its chair- 
man or secretary, was designated as campaign manager or 
director. The cominittee is permanent and the campaign divi- 
sions belong under it. Usually the heads of the various cam- 
paign divisions comprise the membership of this committee, thus 
again securing proper integration. This committee should be 
as small as circumstances will permit and every policy in rela- 
tion to the immediate conduct of the drive should be left in its 
hands by the executive committee. 

The third of the permanent committees is the budget com- 
mittee which appears in almost every city in some form or 
under some name. The usual problem which is presented to it 
is to make a careful survey of the probable demands upon the 
city in the course of the fiscal period adopted by the war chest 
and on the basis of that, after allowing for costs, shrinkage and 
emergencies, set the amount for which the war chest should 
call. It is its duty, in the second place, under normal circum- 
stances, to determine the distribution of that amount among the 
various classes of the community and to that end to construct 
whatever sliding scale may be published in order to distribute 
the burden equably. 

Occasionally the budget committee is called upon to exer- 
cise further functions. If local charities are included it is al- 
most always required, and should always be required, to care- 
fully budget the local charities and determine in advance 
precisely how much each is to receive from the war chest. 
Wherever the disbursement of money to war relief organizations 
has been based upon a budget principle this committee has been 
given the task of determining the amounts which each shall 
receive. This was done with extraordinary care in Rochester 
under the chairmanship of President Rush Rhees of Rochester 
University. In any case the task of this committee is one of 
great delicacy and difficulty and requires time, tact, and large 
ability. 

The publicity committee needs to be a permanent organiza- 
tion, because it should begin work long before the campaign 
and must continue its efforts after the campaign closes. If the 
drive is to be successful public opinion must be educated. If 
collections are to be successful public interest must be maintain- 
ed after the campaign is over. The publicity committee has so 
many functions that it must inevitably have a number of sub- 
committees. As complete a sub-division as any was adopted in 
Springfield, Mass., where there were the following sub-commit- 

33 



tees; Banners and Buttons; Display Advertising for Newspa- 
pers; Educational, Editorial, News, and Color; Factories; Leaf- 
lets and Instructions ; Letters and Circulars ; Posters and Car- 
toons ; Pulpit Messages ; Signs and Sign Boards ; Special Adver- 
tising; and Stationery and Printing. There was beside a 
Speakers' Bureau which had subdivisions for theatres, rallies, 
shops, and the noon lunches of the workers. 

This comimittee should be kept small in number and should 
regard its task as executive in character — the determination of 
policy and overseeing its execution rather than the execution of 
the policy in person. It holds a key position, because the idea 
of the war chest is somewhat complicated and only the most 
persistent and skillful effort will adequately instruct the public 
and ensure the success of the campaign. 

Particularly important is the speakers' bureau, which needs 
to be very carefully organized. Perhaps this was worked out 
as thoroughly as anywhere in Springfield, Ohio, where Mr. John 
Dorst arranged and conducted 601 meetings between the 5th and 
27th of May, the highest number on one day being 63. His 
speakers were so well organized in a comprehensive directory 
that they were notified in ample time and the chairmen of 
meetings also were notified so that there was no confusion. 
Careful planning of that character means a great deal in the 
direction of success for the war chest. 

One of the most important functions of the publicity commit- 
tee, too often overlooked, is the maintenance of an information 
bureau at headquarters during the campaign. That bureau 
should be kept open continuously, in charge of persons who 
thoroughly understand the whole plan and can answer general 
questions promptly and intelligently and tell inquirers exactly 
whom to approach for detailed information on any topic. This 
saves a tremendous amount of bother by the avoidance of un- 
necessary interruptions of overworked executive officers. It 
also improves the temper of workers who dislike to be referred 
from pillar to post and back again for information on some 
simple point. 

Publicity. 

It has been said that the success or failure of the war 
chest rests upon preparation, personnel, and publicity. Of 
these publicity is not the least. It would not be possible in the 
scope of this report to give anything like a complete account 
of the publicity methods which have been used. Cities have 
shown a great deal of originality and the variations in principle 
and method are striking. 

Some cities, for example, attempt to make very elaborate 
poster displays. On the other hand, Syracuse used no posters 
save only a few Red Cross posters with war chest addenda. 
Some attempt to create a slogan and center a tremendous 

34 



amount of advertising about that. Others utterly neglect it. 
Some depend upon newspaper advertisements, others upon read- 
ing matter. Every city has its own pet plan of publicity. 

Columbus, 0., originated the greatest piece of mystery ad- 
vertising which has yet appeared in connection with the war 
chest. The "1 to 31" appeal is said to have been thought of 
while a party was en route to Toronto in order to study Cana- 
dian methods. Certainly it was a tremendous hit from an ad- 
vertising point of view. That slogan and its derivatives have 
been used in a very large number of cities. It is interesting to 
note that despite the success of that appeal other successful 
war chest cities frown upon the use of "mystery" or "teaser" 
advertising. 

In Albany the committee in charge felt that the war chest 
idea was a complicated one and that it needed a great deal of 
educational work to make the public get the real logic of the 
war chest, and not content itself with simply making a gift, but 
make a subscription, which would represent the maximum 
monthly payment possible. This is a great undertaking, and 
in many cities it has been evident that even at the close of the 
campaign there were many people who did not have a clear 
idea of exactly what it was all about. In Albany therefore the 
advertising was not put on the basis of a "stunt", but a complete 
program was laid out, all timed to inform the public. The 
four-minute speeches in the theatres, newspaper stories, and 
advertising were all dovetailed in together on each day in order 
to develop the idea before the public as clearly as possible. It 
was built around the notion that there should be no mystery 
and that there should be no threatening and no "knocking." 
As one of the officials in the war chest put it graphically, "We 
did not use black-jack or lead pipe, but got everybody boosting." 

Rochester had a series of half-page advertisements which 
were run in the newspapers in order to develop the idea of the 
war chest. The titles indicate the nature of the education. 
Th first was "How Much?" There followed in order "How 
Little?", "Advice to Slackers", "Stand Up and Be Counted", 
"Our Lives, Our Fortunes, and Our Sacred Honor", "The Bud- 
get", "The Schedule of Individual Giving", "The Spirit of Giv- 
ing", "Let's Quit Kidding Ourselves and Dig In", "Have We Got 
To Give", "Fix the Amount Yourself", "Your Measure", "Cam- 
paign Expenses", "Are You Satisfied?" 

Because of the size of the problem, Philadelphia used 
a great deal of poster advertising and some of these were ex- 
tremely well done and unusually effective. 

These serve as reasonably typical illustrations of the meth- 
ods which were used in different cities. It is impossible to 
make any categorical statement about which method is best. 
So much depends on the advertising genius of the individual 
who has the matter in charge, that no system can be universally 
applied. 

35 



Another permanent committee of great importance is the 
supply committee. Its function is to determine the quantities 
of material, buttons, window cards, and whatever else may be 
required, and to honor requisitions from the publicity committee 
for materials which that organization may need. The supply 
committee should also undertake the task, which is perhaps the 
most difficult of the entire campaign to achieve without friction, 
namely, the proper distribution of supplies to the workers and 
to the subscribers. This requires a great deal of foresight and 
energy: it also requires space. Usually altogether too little 
attention has been paid to the physical problem involved. For 
example, in one large city all supplies were given out through 
a single door, the consequence being that workers had to wait 
frequently for more than an hour. A small outlay of money in 
erecting temporary shelves and railings, and the organization of 
an adequate clerical force will contribute as few other things 
can toward improving the spirits and temper of workers. 

There is one other caution to this committee. It is aston- 
ishing how nearly unanimous cities are in reporting that they 
ran short of this, that, or the other piece of material. It is 
better to over-buy even at the expense of some waste, because 
nothing checks a campaign more thoroughly than to have some 
vital item of supply missing. Even trivial items of supply are 
important, for human nature is such that it causes a great deal 
of complaint if people have to subscribe without receiving a 
badge or a window card. 

Another permanent comtaittee is the statistics and records 
committee, sometimes called the expense and audit committee, 
or office management committee, all these names being employ- 
ed in various cities to designate committees with virtually the 
same functions. During the drive the statistics committee must 
organize a plan for rapidly reporting the subscriptions which 
are taken, for auditing the statements of all workers, and for 
tabulating the returns. After the drive its responsibilities ex- 
tend to the organization of an office force and the installation 
of a system of bookkeeping and accounting which shall be ade- 
quate to the needs of the community. 

Too much emphasis cannot be put upon the necessity for 
securing men of the largest calibre to serve on the executive 
committee and as chairmen of the other permanent committees. 
Such men cannot be secured without effort. They should not 
be asked over the telephone or casually, but a particular appoint- 
ment should be made and the scope and importance of the task 
laid before them with a view to having them devote their whole 
time to the war chest. This was done in almost all the impor- 
tant cities. Springfield, Mass., in its published booklet stated 
the case well. "The executive committee," it said, "should 
consist of trained executives who shall be able to set aside their 
regular vocations until completion of the campaign," — and 

36 



again, "We recommend concentrated authority in small commit- 
tees composed of members conscious of their responsibility and 
fitted by training and experience to administer the work placed 
in their hands," 

One rather important matter is the advisability of seeing 
to it that each committee has a docket for each meeting. Insist- 
ence upon this will ensure, in the first place, a tremendous 
saving of time through the orderly conduct of business and, in 
the second place, will make it possible for the executive com- 
mittee to know precisely what matters are before its subsidiary 
bodies for consideration, and thus keep an effective check upon 
their activities. 

The further the war chest movement develops the more it 
comes to rely upon the assistance of women in conducting the 
campaigns. In a great many instances women have been made 
the chief factor in the house-to-house work and often have had 
complete charge of that end of the work. Frequently, too, they 
have been used in making up the census. Again, they have 
undertaken the follow-up campaign for new subscriptions, a 
woman being put in charge of a small district in which she is 
to notice and report those who move away, getting the new ad- 
dresses if possible, and to solicit newcomers promptly, thus 
being responsible for an area which she is to keep as nearly as 
possible one hundred per cent, subscribed. Frequently, too, 
women have assisted materially in office work. In one case, 
at Albany, there was a woman's parade in which seventeen 
thousand women marched. In Albany, also, the women arrang- 
ed some very unusual window displays, demonstrating the value 
and character of the work of the several agencies which the war 
chest proposed to assist in supporting. 

In view of these things it seems obvious that the wise plan 
to follow is to have the women represented on the executive 
committee and also on the campaign committee, if the two are 
separate. They should be very largely in charge of the house- 
to-house solicitation and should possibly have the prospect cards 
of the wealthy women givers, so that they will not have a purely 
subsidiary position, but will have opportunity to report some 
gifts of considerable size. Experience has shown them to be 
effective solicitors. 

The representation of Labor in the government of the war 
chest is another item which should never be overlooked. There 
has been criticism in some cities to the effect that the war chest 
was in the hands of bankers and manufacturers. Occasionally 
in consequence there have been reports of friction and in one or 
two instances labor unions have organized Avar chests of their 
own independently and have caused trouble in that way. Occa- 
sionally, too, tactless appropriations for local purposes have 
been planned which caused friction to develop — for example, 
appropriations for local Home Guard units in districts where 

37 



that body was believed by the labor element to be chiefly organ- 
ized to prevent or put down strikes. 

It should never be lost to sight that the workingmen have 
almost invariably done their full share, that their support has 
been larger than anticipated in almost every instance, that the 
unions have shown willingness in many cities to make collec- 
tions, and that workingmen generally have signed authoriza- 
tions requesting their employers to deduct the amounts of their 
pledges from their pay envelopes, which is asking a great deal 
from some points of view. In consideration of all these things 
it is obvious that care should be taken to see that the working- 
men are represented upon the executive committee and are 
given a voice in the determination of policy, the management of 
the campaign, and the disbursement of the funds. 

Campaign Organization. 

In describing the campaign organization the same policy 
must be followed as in describing the permanent organization, 
namely, to draw only the broadest lines of common practice, 
omitting reference for the most part to features individual to 
particular cities. 

There is a growing tendency to make the campaign organ- 
ization permanent, to organize the w^orkers as did Albany into 
a ''Loyal Legion", or as did Syracuse into a "County Defense 
League," etc. This is done in order to create a more or less 
trained body of workers available for every sort of war propa- 
ganda. The tendency, also, is to enlist larger and larger num- 
bers of persons and at the same time to organize them more 
thoroughly and instruct them more, completely, making the task 
of the individual solicitor less in extent but more intensive in 
quality. 

The first item in the conduct of the campaign is the organ- 
ization of a prospect list. This is done in most cases through 
a prospect committee. In several cases, as indicated elsewhere 
in the report, it was done through a census committee in the 
first instance and the final stages were put in the hands of two 
other committees, namely, a transfer committee and a revision 
and classification committee ; the function of the census com- 
mittee being to gather material, the transfer committee having 
as its task the copying to individual cards of the names which 
appear on the census sheets, the revision and classification com- 
mittee having as its problem the final sorting and rating of the 
cards. 

Sometimes even when there is no census the rating commit- 
tee is separate from the prospect committee. As explained 
elsewhere, the work of the rating committee in a city of any 

38 



size must be very largely executive in character, the actual work 
being- done by a large and fluid group, though the responsibility 
for organization and results must always remain with the rat- 
ing committee. 

When the prospect cards have been made up there arises 
the problem of distributing them among the teams. The first 
step is to make distribution among divisions — for example, put- 
ting all the cards of persons to be solicited at their homes in 
one division, all to be solicited at factories, etc., in another divi- 
sion. Distribution within the divisions is then put in the hands 
of the general in charge who is to operate under rules devised 
by the executive committee. 

Within the homes division it appears that the distribution 
is almost always made on a geographical basis. Sometimes 
there is added to this the attempt to make the district equal 
either in number of persons, in size of area, or in value of pros- 
pects. Occasionally where the cards are distributed without 
reference to any of these plans, individual teams are given 
quotas, or the contest among them is put on the basis of the 
percentage of prospects who become givers. All these various 
plans have been developed with a view to creating and stimulat- 
ing competition. 

Within the industrial division the cards are ordinarily 
divided among teams by factories. Rochester, N. Y., and 
Springfield, Mass., developed a system of group rating. The 
cards were distributed so that in Rochester all the teams had 
relatively equal numbers of employees to see and relatively equal 
prospect values as based upon the rating with reference to the 
aggregate pay-roll. 

Frequently, as will appear later, employees are classified 
rather carefully and distribution is made according as they are 
industrial employees, public employees, utility employees, etc. 

The most critical problem comes when the effort is made 
to assign the cards of the so-called individual subscribers. This 
has been achieved in great numbers of ways. The first method 
is by making very careful classification of vocations, giving all 
physicians to one team, all clergy to another, all undertakers to 
another, all lawyers to another, etc. Where any vocation has 
an unusually large number it is divided, merchants being divid- 
ed, for example, into dry-goods merchants, grocery merchants, 
etc. Such a method of distribution of the individual prospect 
cards is relatively simple if the census has been carefully made 
or if there is an up-to-date classified directory by which one can 
speedily sort out all the jewelers or all the plumbers, etc. Where 
this is done however it means that the team competition must 
be based upon percentage of prospects reached, or attainment of 
a group quota, and not upon either the number of subscribers 
or amounts of subscriptions. 

39 



A second method of distributing these cards is to assign 
them geographically. This was done in Youngstown, Ohio. All 
the individual subscribers in one block were given to one team. 
On the whole this method, though used by many cities, is one not 
entirely advisable. It develops neither the group stimulus of 
the method immediately preceding nor does it give equal num- 
bers or equal values of prospects. The competition must be 
based, therefore, as it was in Youngstown on the percentage 
of prospects actually seen irrespective of results. 

A third method is to assign the cards to teams arbitrarily 
without reference to location or any other consideration save 
their prospective value, making an attempt to see that each 
team has prospect cards whose totals are virtually equal. 

A fourth method is to compile a list of the prospects and 
make them available to team captains or entire teams and allow 
them after scrutinizing the list to put in requisitions for such 
cards as they desire with the statement of the reasons. On the 
basis of these requisitions, which are presumed to be made in 
the belief that the team can advantageously approach the desig- 
nated prospect, the assignment of cards is made. Of course 
some names will be requisitioned by many teams. In such 
cases the committee must decide which has shown the better 
reason for desiring a given name. On the other hand, some 
cards will not be requisitioned at all. These should be assigned 
by the committee in inverse ratio to the number and value of 
cards which the team already has, unrequisitioned cards being 
used as a reservoir to ensure each team roughly an equal num- 
ber and an equal value of prospects. 

Inevitably solicitors will wish to "swap" cards no matter 
how carefully assignments may be made. Care must be used, 
if a master list is maintained, to see that these cards are not 
exchanged without proper record of the transaction. Else it 
will be impossible to trace them. For this purpose Springfield, 
Mass., issued a card control book which was put in the hands 
of the secretary of the team, members of teams being allowed 
to exchange prospect cards only at the noon lunch and only when 
the secretary of the team had noted the transaction properly, in 
order to make any necessary change in the master file. Ex- 
changes between members of the same team are relatively sim- 
ple, but exchanges between different teams must be noted at 
headquarters. 

Some solicitors will fail to reach people whom others might 
reach. The personalities of solicitors are so various that it is 
impossible to prevent many refusals which new approaches 
might convert into subscriptions. Certain individuals, more- 
over, will give too little and will need to be re-interviewed in 
order to remind them of their responsibilities and secure gifts 
more in accord with them. This involves the problem of re- 

40 



assignment, one which should not be left for solution in im- 
promptu fashion but carefully provided for in advance of the 
campaign. Rochester dealt with this by passing around, 
toward the last of the campaign, lists of persons who had 
subscribed small amounts or had refused to subscribe and allow- 
ed teams to requisition names for re-canvass. Salem, Mass., 
had this matter taken care of by each captain as the prospect 
cards came back either with no pledge or with a pledge that was 
clearly less than the proper amount. Syracuse, N. Y., organized 
a special committee to handle the matter. Springfield, Mass., 
used its original revision and classification committee which 
studied the subscription file and the refusal file with a view to 
determining whether it was advisable to re-assign cards to new 
solicitors who might make a more successful approach. 

The conclusion reached from a study of this problem is that 
the re-assignment should be in the hands of the original rating 
committee because it is most familiar with the problem and 
because it can anticipate events. The members of this commit- 
tee should not attempt to make the re-solicitations themselves 
but should limit themselves. in the course of the campaign to mak- 
ing re-assignments. But it would frequently be advisable for 
them to be permitted to assign these names at their discretion 
entirely, not limiting them to members of teams but simply 
letting them use their best judgment as to the most effective 
way of producing desired results. 

Overlapping. 

In every intensive campaign there arises the problem of 
dealing with duplication and overlapping in the work of solicita- 
tion. 

A number of cities make no effort to avoid this. Meriden, 
for example, had the factory and business solicitation first and 
everyone subscribing at his place of employment was given a 
special receipt card which he was supposed to leave at his home. 
Later the canvassers of the homes division went out with the 
census cards as prospect cards and solicited at the homes. When 
a receipt card was presented the census card was marked "P" 
against that name, which was the symbol for a factory pledge. 
When no receipt card was presented the persons were solicited 
and the names marked "HP" for home pledge. The idea was 
that the solicitor should account for every name on the census 
card before the campaign was over. Torrington, also employed 
this method. As is brought out elsewhere, this is a thorough 
but somewhat slow method for communities of large size. Al- 
bany, N. Y., in like manner allowed the homes division to over- 
lap without making any particular effort to prevent double so- 
licitation. 

41 



Cleveland met this problem by having a form letter which 
read: 

"The campaign committee has just made official assignment of 
names to be solicited for contributions to Cleveland's War Fund quota. 
Your name has been assigned to me. In order to conserve the time 
of the men working for our various teams and to avoid duplication of 
work, this letter has been prepared by the campaign committee and 
each team worker has been requested to mail a copy of it to various 
individuals and business interests assigned to him. I shall, therefore, 
take pleasure in calling upon you during the week of the campaign and 
trust you will hold your subscription for me." 

Each worker sent a copy of the letter to every one assigned to 
him so that while the individual might be called upon by another 
solicitor he would be in no doubt to whom his solicitation belong- 
ed, and serious overlapping and cross-solicitation was avoided. 

A common device, employed in Philadelphia, for example, 
is to have the card soliciation take place in the early part of the 
week and the house-to-house solicitation after the card campaign 
is completed. Under this plan the people who have already 
subscribed may have window signs up so that the solicitor can 
readily avoid duplication of effort. There is however one dif- 
ficulty in this method, namely, that one member of the house 
may have subscribed at his place of employment and put up 
the card while other members have been missed. Thus the 
window card may serve as a preventative of their being solicited 
at all. 

Rochester, N. Y., avoided cross-solicitation by making out 
"stop cards" instructing the solicitor in the geographical sec- 
tion whom not to see. 

Still another plan was devised in Columbus, Ohio, and used 
in other Ohio cities, namely, to check on the census cards before 
the campaign those who were to be seen at their homes. These 
were readily sorted since they were for persons who had no 
business addresses but who were nevertheless employed, such 
as chauffeurs, maids, etc. All others, i. e., those who were to be 
seen at their places of business, were left unchecked, and a 
booklet was printed containing a list of the names of those to 
be approached by the individual subscribers division. The 
homes division solicited only those whose names were checked 
on the census cards. The factories division and the other di- 
visions which went for groups avoided cross-solicitation by ref- 
erence to the pamphlet list. It may be suggested that this is 
not a very thorough-going or simple manner of preventing cross- 
solicitation as between the individual subscribers division and 
the factories division, though it is effective as between the 
homes division and all others. 

York, Pa., avoided overlapping by publishing certain class- 
es which were to be avoided, as lawyers, doctors, the poor- 
house, lodges, women, etc. 

42 



Of course the most certain and complete method of avoid- 
ing cross-solicitation and conflict is to have a separate prospect 
card for every individual as did Springfield, Mass. 

Team Structure. 

The properly organized team consists of a captain, and in a 
big drive usually also of a secretary or auditor, and a number of 
lieutenants, or whatever the workers may be called. In a well- 
planned drive the captain should not do much of the work of 
solicitation himself but should be an overseer of the work of his 
team, in a position to direct and help his men and to convey to 
them the orders from higher campaign officers. All orders to 
workers should be transmitted through him; he should be the 
spokesman to and for his men. He should be thoroughly in- 
formed so that he may answer questions and he ought to be a 
source of inspiration and encouragement, keeping a check on 
what each individual is doing and seeing to it that he does not 
fall down. The captains' manual published by Cleveland and 
Indianapolis called upon the men who assumed that responsi- 
bility to devote their whole time between nine a. m. and four 
p. m. exclusively to the work of the campaign. 

The team secretary is usually the active man. The cap- 
tain needs to be in one place where he can be readily found and 
should be freed from clerical work. The team secretary is in 
the position of the captain's adjutant. He should have posses- 
sion of the card control book, should check over the returns with 
prospect cards, calling important cases to his captain's atten- 
tion, should audit the reports of the individual workers, and in 
general should do w^hatever is clerical in character. 

The team itself may be of any convenient size. If there 
is thorough organization with a captain and secretary there is 
no reason why the team should not be fairly large with fifteen 
or twenty members. Where there is less thorough organiza- 
tion with only a captain, the team should be small, certainly 
with not over eight or nine members. 

If success is to be achieved there must be discipline. It 
is important therefore to carefully instruct the workers to go 
first and always to the captain with questions and to take orders 
from no one else. Toledo carried this further and insisted that 
verbal orders should not be given or received, but provided 
blanks after the fashion of telegraph blanks on which all or- 
ders were to be written. 

It is equally important that the captain should at all times 
be able to get in touch with his workers and that majors, 
colonels, or generals should be able to reach their respective 
captains. To that end a number of cities have worked out 
regular directory forms. For example, Coshocton, Ohio, had 
one form to cover the township organization, another for the 

43 



homes division, etc., showing the names, addresses, and 'phone 
numbers. The campaign manager should have a similar direc- 
tory. All these ought to be made up under two arrangements : 
first, in alphabetical order and, second, under the '^military" 
plan. 

In many districts under the drive system the practice has 
developed of having separate teams for the various racial groups 
within the community. This plan has occasionally been followed 
in war chest cities. Generally speaking, it has not been adopted 
and largely for two reasons; first, because of the fact that the 
organization of the campaign ordinarily does not facilitate it, 
and, secondly, because of the fact that an effort is made to make 
the campaign a strongly American propaganda and it is desired 
to discourage the use of Italian teams, Irish teams, or any other 
brand of team which will not carry a strictly American impli- 
cation. 

There is, however, one phase of this matter that should not 
be overlooked and that is that in taking the census it is necessary 
to use, if not racial teams, at least racial auxiliaries if the names 
are to be gotten accurately ; it is necessary, in the second place, 
if persons of foreign birth are to be rated, that individuals ac- 
quainted with their circumstances should be used in making up 
prospect cards ; and, finally, in some cases teams will need to 
have interpreters, the solicitation being made by two people, one 
of them acting as interpreter. 

Check up on Workers. 

For the effective control of a campaign there must be an 
opportunity to check up what the workers are achieving. This 
is essential, also, to proper discipline and is a problem to which 
relatively few cities have given adequate consideration. 

Youngstown, Ohio, by means of its peculiar prospect card, 
which carried not one but sixty names and which had a space 
to indicate after each name what had been done with it, made 
it possible for the captain to see each day, almost at a glance, 
how much each one of his workers had done. This made it 
possible for him to spur them on, to. give them aid or to do what- 
ever was needful. The workers were further stimulated by 
receiving a 100% button as soon as all the names on the pros- 
pect card had been accounted for, and whenever all the names 
assigned to one team had been reported upon, that team was 
given a 100% flag. 

A project sketched out in Syracuse, though whether de- 
veloped to completion I do not know, was to have a series of 
charts. This idea, carried to its logical conclusion, would re- 
sult in a system something as follows. The war cabinet or 
campaign manager would have a chart showing the various 
divisions, the number of cards assigned to each division, and 

44 



the total amount of the prospect cards assigned to each. At 
the close of the day, on the basis of the returns, the total num- 
ber of pledges and the total amount from each division should 
be entered, as well as the percentage of the expected totals which 
they represented. This would allow the manager to see how each 
division was measuring up to its responsibilities as a whole. 
The head of each division, in turn, would have a similar chart 
showing the total number of cards and the total amount of pros- 
pects in the hands of each team. At the close of the day, on 
the basis of the returns, it could be filled out in exactly the 
same m.anner to show him how each team was meeting its re- 
sponsibilities, where encouragement was necessary, where stim- 
ulus was requisite, etc. In similar manner each captain would 
have a chart presenting the same data for the members of his 
team, which could be prepared for him by the team secretary 
or auditor. 

This plan gives a complete check from the top to the bottom 
showing each executive officer in turn where weaknesses have 
developed and locating the responsibility exactly. It has an 
advantage beyond simply making it possible to bolster weak- 
nesses, for the very fact that the workers know there is such 
a chart makes them appreciate their responsibilities and spurs 
them on. Springfield, Mass., had a check-up system through 
its card control books in the hands of regimental secretaries 
and through its file of master cards which were arranged alpha- 
betically by classes. These master cards were carbon duplicates 
of the prospect cards and were kept in what was known as file 
No. 1. File No. 2 consisted of the original of the prospect cards, 
when returned with a pledge card attached, and sorted into 
boxes which represented the teams. File No. 3 was made up 
of original prospect cards of those who refused to make any 
subscription. Thus it was possible for team secretaries to see 
what workers had achieved and also for the revision and class- 
ification committees to make reassignments. 

The ideal system would, perhaps, be a combination of the 
chart system described above and the method employed in 
Springfield. Other cities have developed other plans, some of 
them based on a review by the captain of the census card for 
his district, but in general they do not have the features essen- 
tial to building a simple and smooth-running machine. 

100% Organization. 

The esprit de corps of the campaign organization depends 
on the completeness of its integration, upon the discipline main- 
tained, upon the thoroughness with which it is checked up, and, 
lastly, upon its enthusiasm and conviction. One must recognize 
the fact that an organization of this kind is essentially a body 
of salesmen and the first requisite of a salesman is that he 

45 



shall believe in his own goods. With the intention of develop- 
ing a body of workers convinced of the value and wisdom of 
the plans they are trying to execute, several cities, among them 
Albany, Cleveland, Indianapolis, and Syracuse, made an effort 
to have a 100% organization, that is, to have every solicitor 
himself a subscriber to a sacrificial extent — in accordance with 
the published schedules, if possible — before he went out to ask 
others to subscribe. In Syracuse the reports on the first night 
had reference solely to the subscriptions by the solicitors them- 
selves. The result of this plan is to give an organization which 
is committed to the idea, and fully committed. It weeds out 
the faint-hearted, the half-convinced, and gives the solicitor an 
approach which nothing else can do. 

Badges. 

Another important point to bear in mind is to see to it 
that the solicitors have proper badges. As one writes about it, 
it seems a very trifling point, but experience has demonstrated 
that there is a great psychological effect in a badge. Albany 
used large pins which were numbered and had a space in which 
draftsmen printed the name and title of the worker. Each pin 
was recorded very carefully with the thought of impressing 
the matter on the workers. Much the same thing was done in 
Syracuse and Rochester, with similar results. The pins were 
prized, they gave the solicitors recognition for their work, made 
them readily recognizable, and thus avoided opportunity for 
fraud on the part of impostors. These and other cities testi- 
fied that the badge became a very strong feature of the cam- 
paigns. 

Campaign Divisions. 

In the organization of campaign divisions, the first is the 
individual subscribers group. This varies in size in accordance 
with its inclusiveness. Sometimes it includes all those who are 
to be solicited individually and not as factory or other groups 
or in the home. Sometimes it is a relatively small group and 
persons ordinarily included are differentiated into other divi- 
sions. For example, a number of cities including Akron and 
Youngstown, Ohio, and Rome, N. Y., had a special division for 
corporations, which made it its sole business to get subscriptions 
from boards of directors. 

No standard has developed with regard to the solicitation of 
corporations. Some cities put a good deal of emphasis upon this 
feature of their campaigns. In one prominent instance it is said 
that about 45% of the total am_ount of the war chest was con- 
tributed by corporations. On the other hand, a number of cities 
do not countenance this sort of solicitation, usually upon grounds 
which when analyzed come back to one main reason, namely that 

46 



the solicitation of corporations in some instances amounts to a 
double solicitation and in other instances gives individuals op- 
portunity to hide behind a group and dodge their personal re- 
sponsibilities. Some communities on this ground have made a 
distinction between partnerships and corporations and have so- 
licited corporations but not partnerships, calling on the imper- 
sonal bodies to give but not asking people who can readily be 
reached as individuals to subscribe as business firms. 

A prominent instance of refusal to solicit corporations is 
Detroit, which went on the assumption that it might permit 
some persons to escape their obligations. Those in charge of the 
war chest allowed corporations to make subscriptions unsolic- 
ited and their subscriptions amounted in all to about $300,000, 
relatively a very small percentage of the total. Detroit did, 
however, substitute for this a request that the corporation 
should underwrite or guarantee the pledges of their workmen. 
Rochester, N. Y., in like manner laid particular emphasis upon 
not soliciting corporation gifts but insisted that "individual 
gift" should be the keynote of the campaign. In one or two 
cities a distinction was made between corporations which were 
owned within the area of the war chest and those which were 
called "foreign corporations." There was no solicitation of 
those whose owners lived within the district and could be reach- 
ed individually, but solicitation was made of the foreign-owned 
corporations which is was felt owed something as entities to the 
community. Some cities have changed their minds on this im- 
portant topic and one or two which did not take corporation 
subscriptions have now decided that it would have been better 
to have done so. 

By far the larger proportion of the war chests did ask cor- 
porations to make subscriptions. It was estimated in Spring- 
field, Ohio, that the corporations ought to produce 30% of the 
total gift. Other cities have varied this somewhat, calling for 
either more or less. It has been very common to rate the cor- 
porations. In Springfield, Ohio, it was argued that 5% of the 
earnings of corporations was not an unfair amount. In Ken- 
osha, Wis., business houses and corporations were asked to 
give as a firm gift an amount equivalent to that of the employ- 
ees, excepting the office forces and the executive forces. This 
plan was followed by Attleboro, Batavia, and Michigan City. 
In other places corporations were asked to give one-half of 1% 
of their annual sales. Still others asked for a percentage based 
on the number of employees, etc. 

On the whole there seems to be no good reason why corpo- 
rations should not in most cases be asked to make contributions. 
In certain instances where the owners all live in the communi- 
ty and are known there, it is perfectly proper for them to make 
their contributions as individuals. In many, if not all, Con- 
necticut communities, however, there are a number of corpora- 

47 



tions owned by outside interests, which owe something to the 
communities in which they operate and which normally will be 
glad to contribute to war chests. It must be remembered in 
the case of banks that they have to designate their gifts under 
the ruling of the Comptroller of the Currency. 

Again, a number of cities. Glens Falls, Rochester and Syra- 
cuse for instance, had a small number of cards in the hands of 
the executive committee. These usually are the cards of the 
largest subscribers. 

Some cities had separate divisions for the merchants. 
Syracuse had a merchants' division, and the teams within were 
composed of jewelers, dry-goods men, etc. Still others had a 
separate division for manufacturers, for example, Glens Falls, 
N. Y., and Kenosha, Wis. Others had a separate division for 
professional men, for example, Cambridge and Chillicothe, Ohio, 
with special teams for physicians, bankers, lawyers, dentists, 
etc. 

A survey of practice in a large number of cities makes 
it seem advisable on the whole to put all of these in two divi- 
sions ; the first, which is frequently called the executive commit- 
tee division, to include the corporations and the very largest 
givers ; second, an individual subscribers division, to cover all 
the rest of those who have prospect cards which call for solici- 
tation neither in the home nor in factory or other groups. There 
seems to be a good deal of question about the desirability of 
separating the vocational, professional and mercantile teams. 
Speaking generally, better results are obtained by simply assign- 
ing the names carefully among properly chosen teams rather 
than following the vocational lines — though it ought to be said 
that cities which have used that plan have often succeeded. 
Some of them, however, have indicated that despite that fact 
they should not follow the plan again. 

The third division, under the composite scheme here out- 
lined, is one which is almost universally used, namely, the divi- 
sion of factory employees. As indicated elsewhere, the assign- 
ment in this division should be on the basis of group rating 
among teams, substantially according to the plan employed by 
Rochester. That city had five factory groups and the assign- 
ment was so well made that the results of the competition were 
extremely close. It is worth while to detail them by way of 
illustration. The northwest division had 11,609 subscribers, 
the northeast division 10,675, the southwest 10,936, the south- 
east 10,310, and the central 10,310. Reduced to percentage, 
these are respectively: 99.9%, 92%, 967c, 99 A%, and 93.7%o. 
Computation shows that the assignment among the sections 
was extraordinarily even and scrutiny of the production figures 
shows that there was developed a close competition. Substan- 
tially, the same result was produced in Springfield and other 
cities by analogous methods. 

48 



The fourth division takes care of pubHc utility employees. 
It includes, of course, the railways and in some cases conduc- 
tors, brakemen, engineers, firemen, and shopmen were reached 
through separate teams. It includes also the street railway 
employees and those of the telephone, express, electric light and 
gas light companies. Among these the competition must be in 
terms of percents, unless they are distributed to teams on the 
group rating plan used in connection with the factory employees. 

The fifth division is that of public employees which may 
be differentiated into federal employees, including mail car- 
riers, custom house clerks, internal revenue officers, etc. ; second, 
state employees; third, county employees. Usually state em- 
ployees and county emijloyees require only one team apiece, 
except in capital cities. Last of all there are the city employ- 
ees which may be in several subdivisions ; schools, public works, 
public safety — including firemen and policemen — parks, en- 
gineering, etc. 

The sixth division is made up of retail employees and this 
may be divided, either as are the factories on the basis of group 
assessment, or geographically, or both ; or they may be divided 
according to various sorts of retail employees with special teams 
for each, working the matter out in as great detail as seems 
desirable. On the whole, the first method suggested appears 
decidedly the better. 

A great deal of variance in emphasis upon the solicitation 
of persons at their homes has been developed. Some cities have 
gone so far as to make no house-to-house solicitation on the 
ground that it means simply double solicitation, since the per- 
sons in the home are not producers, are without income, and 
in consequence ought not to be asked to subscribe, especially 
inasmuch as most of them belong to the families of workmen 
who give all they ought to give through the shops. In such 
cases an effort is usually made to discover those persons who 
have no places of employment and yet have incomes and to 
reach those who can afford to give without undue sacrifice. A 
survey of the towns which paid no attention whatever to a 
house-to-house solicitation shows that for the most part they do 
not have the most successful war chests. 

The next to the least emphasis on the house-to-house solici- 
tation came in cities where this was used as a sort of a clean-up 
campaign to catch loose pennies. Such was the idea involved 
in the Cleveland plan. It was also the Kenosha idea for in 
that city the house-to-house solicitation was left to Boy Scouts, 
who very naturally are not expert salesmen. 

It does stand to reason that if the solicitation through em- 
ployment is made sufficiently comprehensive the house-to-house 
canvass is largely duplicative and to that extent undesirable, 
especially if the greatest care has not been used in the prepara- 
tion of the prospect list. 

49 



This division is occasionally subdivided by the creation of a 
woman's division, organized wholly separately. 

It seems advisable, however, that all this work should be 
turned over to the women's teams and that there should be no 
women's division. This division should be divided according 
to wards, precincts and blocks. Its activities should be post- 
poned until after the campaign has been thoroughly started. 
This makes it much easier to handle the organization, because 
it is not necessary to distribute so many supplies or to instruct 
so many people all at once. It lets the work move on more 
evenly. Also it indicates, what ought to be the case, that the 
homes division is not the main reliance of the campaign, the 
work being in the nature of gleaning. This is true because 
seeing people in the homes is a much slower and much less 
certain process than seeing them at their places of business, 
and because there is less group or other stimulus in solicitation 
in the homes. Experience has demonstrated this beyond ques- 
tion as is pointed out elsewhere. 

The question whether pupils in schools should be solicited 
is one which has been debated very earnestly and opinions are 
almost always very positive one way or the other. 

The argument against the solicitation of children in the 
schools is that the war chest should approach only the producer 
and that for the most part school children do not earn money. 
The solicitation of pupils, therefore, is simply a demand upon 
the wage earner that he give twice. This puts an unusual 
burden upon the man of small income who is subject to a good 
deal of pressure developed by his fellow workmen to give in his 
shop. To ask him in addition to give something through the 
schools is unfair, for it means nothing to the rich man to let 
his children give a small amount. 

Cities which object to the solicitation of pupils frequently 
allow schools as a whole to make pledges, the pupils agreeing 
to earn the amount. In one case the graduating class of a 
school turned over to the war chest the money which it had 
intended to put into a class gift, a precedent which speedily 
found emulation in the other schools of the city. 

The argument is frequently offered too that it is better 
to allow only the Junior Red Cross within the schools because 
that has great educational force. This argument certainly is 
not without a great deal of merit. The amount of money in- 
volved is small and the sentimental and educational value is 
relatively large. 

Cities, on the other hand, which have solicited the pupils 
feel that the plan has very definite value because it links up 
the children in a great community movement. Springfield, 
Mass., for example, did not intend to solicit students but the 
demand for the campaign came from the pupils themselves. 
Some cities, on the other hand, made very elaborate prepara- 

50 



tions. In Attleboro, Mass., pledge cards were furnished for all 
school children, including those in the parochial schools, and 
there was a special school children's day on which all the pledges 
were turned in, prizes being given for the first ten rooms to 
make 100% enlistments and cards bearing "100%" put up in 
those schools which reached that amount. Likewise each week 
they have a "soldier's hour" on Wednesday at ten o'clock when 
whistles are blown, bells are rung, and special exercises are 
held, a plan which seems to have been originated in Kenosha, 
Wis. 

There has been some question as to the advisability oi 
school solicitation from the standpoint of bookkeeping and ac- 
counting. The handling of small pledges is difficult and ex- 
pensive and one or two cities which canvassed the schools have 
since regretted it because of the bookkeeping entailed. The 
only proper way to handle this difficulty is after the manner 
of Attleboro where the parent's signature is required on each 
pupil's pledge card, which means that there has been consulta- 
tion and consent at home; where the teachers retain the pledge 
cards and post the payments on them each week; where the 
payments are made not throughout the year but only during 
school weeks; and where the payments are made to teachers, 
not to the war chest office. It is not possible to be as rigid in 
the matter of delinquencies, etc., in the school pledge and at 
best a great deal of flexibility and decentralization must be al- 
lowed and the only war chest account should be a school account. 

The conclusion that a survey of the evidence induces is that 
the schools had perhaps better be canvassed but that special 
effort should be made not to allow the amount to be burdensome. 
Moreover it should not be allowed to interfere with the Junior 
Red Cross movement. This can be achieved either by a special 
solicitation for that purpose or by emphasizing in the schools 
the nature and value of the Red Cross and insisting, as did 
Columbus, on the performance of such duties and exercises as 
will demonstrate a real interest in Red Cross work, the payment 
of the fee being made from the war chest. Of course, any 
pupil who did not contribute to the war chest could join the 
Red Cross on payment of the proper amount. 

The last division is composed of the townships, or the re- 
mainder of the county, and is variously named. Usually this 
division is rather loosely organized — each town, save for a 
certain central guidance, building its own campaign structure 
and reporting as a unit to the central headquarters. Frequently 
it has been too loosely organized, which explains in part the 
failure of the rural districts to produce in proportion to their 
capacity. 

Occasionally there have been farmers' divisions and com- 
muters' divisions. These seem unnecessary, and even unwise, 
and should be merged in the township or county division. 

51 



Sometimes, too, there have been fraternal divisions designed to 
reach men through their lodges. This is a duplicative feature 
because the men are seen either as individual subscribers or as 
employees. It is, therefore, a cross solicitation and, should in 
consequence be omitted. 

Score Boards. 

Every city has its own idea with regard to a proper score 
board. In Cleveland the board did not show team amounts, 
the only thing put on the board was a gold star, if a team had 
"raised its proportion of its quota for that day. Each team had 
a daily quota, the first day to raise 25%, the second day 15% 
and so on. If a team raised more than the quota, the captain 
coiild hold that much back for next day. The consequence was 
that at the close everyone of the thirty-six teams had a full set 
of stars. This eliminated all soreness and teams which did not 
have as good prospects as others were given an equal chance to 
shine. 

One of the most striking of the score boards was that of 
Rochester, which took pains to make the board big enough so 
that every name and figure could be easily read. One whole 
side was given to the factory employees division. Factories had 
after them only marks of percentage, a most impressive sight to 
see the enormous number of factories with 100% after the 
name. After each team the board showed also the total amount 
of pledges, the total number of pledges and the total percentage 
of employees. The other side of the board showed the work of 
the county division, expressed in terms of amounts and show- 
ing the total amount and total number of pledges, the utility 
employees division, the public employees division, the retail em- 
ployees division, and the individual subscribers division, all 
showing the same data — save that under the individual sub- 
scribers division there was a separate heading for the team 
workers' subscriptions. The center of the board accumulated 
the grand totals, at the left the amount of pledges and at the 
right the number of pledges. 

The ordinary type of score board gives for each team the 
amount raised during the day, the number of subscriptions dur- 
ing the day, and the total of both up to that time, accumulating 
grand totals at the end for each team and for each division. 

It is not necessary to describe other score boards. The 
only comment that is desirable is that they should be made as 
clear as possible by building them sufficiently large. 

Instructions to Workers. 

There is the greatest divergence in practice among cities 
with regard to instructing the workers. Some cities have is- 
sued separate instructions for captains, some separate instruc- 

52 



tions for homes division workers, factory employee workers, 
etc. Some have limited the instructions to plain directions as 
to procedure, others have incorporated a catechism of question 
and answer designed to assist the war chest worker in under- 
standing the problem himself and to facilitate his work in an- 
swering questions. The range of topics dealt with is great in 
extent. 

Perhaps the briefest and most serviceable way of dealing 
with this topic is to build a composite set of instructions, which 
might read as follows: 

1 — Badge. Always wear the badge telling your name and 
number when soliciting. Positive instructions have been issued 
to the public not to receive workers who do not wear these offi- 
cial buttons. 

2 — Salesmanship. You are going to sell subscriptions to 
the war chest and a good 'salesman should know his line from all 
angles. Therefore, study the booklet, "What is a War Chest", 
and other literature. Subscriptions are not secured by hypnosis 
or begging, but by tactful, business-like and convincing presen- 
tation of the needs and objects of the war chest. 

3 — Tact and Persistence. Be tactfully persistent — ^those 
who refuse to subscribe at first will often do so on the second 
and third call. Do not be easily discouraged. Keep after them, 
this is patriotic work. Tactfully and persistently showing there 
is no real reason for his not subscribing, explain how easy the 
extended payments make the matter and urge him to a generous 
decision. Don't accept a refusal on a first call — ask him to 
think it over and say you will come again and be sure to do so. 
When an answer is given which seems final, accept it thankfully, 
though the subscription be small and gracefully, if it is a re- 
fusal, leaving him at least a friend of the war chest. 

4 — Work in pairs. Whenever possible solicitors should 
work in pairs, as experience has shown that in a matter of this 
kind more effective soliciting can be achieved in that manner. 

5 — Thoroughness. Everyone in the city must be solicited. 
Everyone must be given an opportunity to take a share in the 
war chest. Cover every prospect assigned you — no one should 
be missed. 

6 — Discipline. If you desire information or anything at 
all, apply to your immediate superior. Never go over his head 
unless it is impossible to reach him. 

7 — Attendance. In order to avoid mistakes, to understand 
your task, and to do your work effectively, it is essential that 
you attend all meetings and luncheons. One hundred per cent, 
attendance is the goal. Are you going to be the one to prevent 
its attainment? 

8 — Punctuality. Whatever you do, be on time. The late 
arrival of one man discommodes many and often upsets the 
working of a whole team. It is unfair to your associates. 

53 



9 — Trespassing. Talk and boost the war chest wherever 
you go, but do not solicit or accept subscriptions from those not 
assigned you. Annoyance will result if this caution is disre- 
garded. If there is special reason, accept the subscription and 
turn it over to the worker to whom it was assigned. Be gener- 
ous in the matter. 

10 — Use of Telephone. Never solicit over the telephone. 
When telephoning to learn if a man is in, avoid a discussion 
of the war chest. Do not allow him to make up his mind until 
you have seen him personally. 

11 — Use of Scale or Rating, (a) Under no circumstances 
do we want to advise anyone what he shall do. Never allow 
yourself to be caught in making a suggestion, even. Any 
amount including $1.00 and more v/ill be entirely satisfactory 
from anyone (Terre Haute). 

(b) Each card authorizing solicitation will contain in the 
upper right-hand corner an amount showing the class in which 
the prospect has been placed by the revision and classification 
committee, for convenience in distributing the cards. The so- 
licitor must not use the amount suggested on the cards in mak- 
ing solicitation. This is a free-will offeiing. Every contribu- 
tor must feel that no pressure is to be brought upon him by 
anyone to say what he shall give (Springfield, Mass.). 

(c) The solicitor should suggest to the contributor to sub- 
scribe in the ratio suggested upon the patriotic quota card, but 
if such per cent, of his income is in excess of the amount the 
contributor can afford, then the contributor should be urged to 
subscribe to the limit of what he can afford within the year 
(Indianapolis). 

(d) Solicitors must not accept a subscription from any in- 
dividual or firm unless sure that it is in accordance with our 
schedule (Racine). 

12 — Return Calls. Call back again if you are unable to 
secure an interview the first time. Subscription blanks left 
behind are seldom signed. See him personally the second time 
without fail. 

13 — Forms of Pledges. (These should be very explicitly 
explained.) 

14 — Signatures. Prospects themselves must sign all sub- 
scriptions with ink or indelible pencil. Do not sign for any 
subscriber. 

15 — Clearness and Legibility. Carefully go over the sub- 
scription card in the subscriber's presence. In printed letters 
rewrite the name on the line provided and also rewrite on the 
back of the card whatever is not clear. This means dollars to 
the war chest by elimination of work and avoidance of errors. 

16 — Your Own Signature. Be sure to sign your name and 
the number of your team to each subscription card. If you are 
working with any member of your team, both names should 

54 



appear. This is frequently extremely important for the treas- 
urer at the close of the campaign. 

17 — Completeness. Failure to fill out any blanks on the 
pledge cards is certain to cause trouble. Do not fail to see that 
they are complete. 

18 — Return Prospect Cards. Under no circumstances neg- 
lect to return the prospect card with the proper notation of 
the results ; give either the amount of the subscription or the 
reason for refusal. 

19 — Cash, (a) If you receive cash on any pledge enclose 
it with the pledge card in the envelope provided for the purpose 
and seal. Do not fail to enter the amount paid on the pledge 
card. 

(b) Under no circumstances is a worker to receive cash or 
check with a subscription. Pledges only are allowable. 

20 — Report. Have your report ready when you reach the 
luncheon. Check it over carefully before turning it in to the 
secretary in order to lighten his burden as much as possible. 
List subscriptions legibly. 

21 — Supplies. Your supplies should contain instruction 
sheet, badge, pledge cards, cash envelopes, report envelopes, 
window cards. Check up the contents at once and if anything 
is missing, report to your team secretary. Always apply to him 
for supplies. 

22 — Sportsmanship. Remember that we are volunteers, 
that no one can foresee every contingency and that the success 
of this campaign is built upon your interest, your cheerfulness, 
your enthusiam, your generosity, and your sportsmanship. Do 
not allow small things to irritate you. 

Each of the topics included occurs in the instructions issued 
by a large number of cities. Frequently the passage is taken 
bodily; occasionally it is a composite; in a few instances it has 
been drafted with a view to expressing an idea common to many, 
but without using their words. 



55 



CHAPTER THREE 



THE CAMPAIGN. 

One of the most serious problems in laying out the work of 
a war chest campaign arises from the need for a prospect list 
in order effectively to cover the territory and to make proper 
distribution of the work among the solicitors. This is abso- 
lutely vital to success and as a rule, though subject to certain 
exceptions for special reasons, the more complete the prospect 
list the more successful the war chest campaign is likely to be. 

Census. 

The first method of developing a complete and accurate 
prospect list is by means of a patriotic census. Often this cen- 
sus has a value and is intended to have a value beyond the war 
chest campaign. It is frequently made to serve as a foundation 
for later Liberty loan canvassing, for recruiting Red Cross 
workers, for war savings propaganda, for fuel and food con- 
servation work, etc. In many instances, therefore, if not in 
most, the census must be regarded not only from the point of 
view of its usefulness in the war chest campaign but it must be 
judged also from the point of view of its general usefulness 
in the community for other war activities. In one city, for 
example, the war savings director reported that twice as many 
War Savings Stamps were sold as a result of the census, and 
the Liberty loan chairman regarded it as one of his most val- 
uable assets. 

The purposes of the patriotic census therefore are, first of 
all, to gain a list of people active in war work or willing to be- 
come active, secondarily to furnish the foundation for a prospect 
list, and finally to serve as an educational feature. In Terre 
Haute this latter was emphasized in the instructions to war 
chest workers which said : 

"The importance of this movement will be more thoroughly im- 
pressed on the family in resident districts if the lieutenant first of all 
requests a census of the household, including all men and women over 
eighteen years old. This method gives the lieutenants an opportunity 
to meet all the members of that household and to talk over and explain 
thoroughly the object of this movement." 

56 



In Springfield, Mass., the census was made a great patriotic 
affair. Advertisements published in the newspapers gave the 
following reasons for the census : 

"Unity in organization constitutes the working strength of a great 
cause and the more profoundly it appeals to us the greater the neces- 
sity of getting together. This war must be prosecuted not only by 
the men who come to the colors but by the united, steady, and adequate 
support of all the people behind them. Mass meetings call out a part 
of the people, but what is needed is a plan by which all can be included, 
every man and woman, boy and girl, who is willing to help the Govern- 
ment and the soldiers and sailors. No obligation is involved in this 
novel registration, only the expression of a desire to assist the Govern- 
ment in whatever way one can do it. The service we can render will 
vary greatly and it cannot be measured in dollars and cents. The 
widow who gives her mite or voluntarily adds to the burden of her 
toil, or sends her boy to join the colors, is rendering a service which 
cannot be measured in gold. 

"This census is a roll of honor in its truest s-ense. It will be as 
nearly as it is possible to make it an accurate enrollment of the men, 
women, and children of Springfield who are loyal to their country and 
who stand ready to do their share to win the war." 

These statements of the purpose of the census show the very 
broad character and comprehensiveness of its intentions. Per- 
sonal observation in Springfield made it perfectly evident that 
the census did result in a tremendous awakening on the part of 
the public to a realization of the war and to a quickening of a 
sense of responsibility on the part of individuals with regard 
to their relation to the war. Also the census resulted in a great 
stimulus to all patriotic activities. 

When one approaches the task of describing the methods 
employed in taking a census, the questions asked, and the uses 
to which the information has been put, it becomes speedily 
evident that cities have developed a great deal of originality in 
these matters. 

Among the first to use the census was Terre Haute, where 
the sheets were made in triplicate by means of carbon on a very 
simple blank. The second copy was retained by the census- 
taker, the first copy was retained by his captain, and the orig- 
inal was sent to the office of the war chest. In that case the 
census was used, so far as the war chest was concerned, not so 
much for the purposes of building a prospect list as for follow- 
up work after the campaign had closed. It was designed to 
make opportunity to check back from the membership pledges 
so a-:, to discover who had not signed in any particular household 
and to go over the ground again as often as necessary, "preach- 
ing patriotism and loyalty to those who need it most." 

Another of the earlier attempts at a census was made in 

57 



Rome, N. Y. The blank used in that city called for the names 
of the occupants, places of employment, estimate of income, and 
any other remarks. The column with regard to income was to 
be filled out not in response to a question by the census-taker, 
but on the basis of the census-taker's judgment as to the circum- 
stances of the family. While this appears to have worked well 
in Rome, attempts on the part of other cities to use it brought 
difficulties, because census-takers incautiously asked the in- 
comes, not having been sufficiently instructed. Moreover the 
judgment of the census-taker with regard to income would have 
value only with regard to the income of the head of the house, 
not with regard to others in the same family who might be 
employed. Then, too, the judgment of the census-taker with 
regard to the income of the head of the house as based on man- 
ner of life, etc., might very likely be inaccurate and consequently 
misleading to the rating committee. These criticisms apply to 
the attempts on the part of other cities to copy the Rome plan, 
for as already indicated it was a success there and was regarded 
as having paid for the effort involved because of its advertising 
value alone and because of its educational qualities. 

Another community which developed the census idea was 
Pittsfield, Mass., which had a card providing for the name; a 
symbol to denote whether the individual listed was the head 
of the house, wife, son, daughter, boarder, employee, or relative ; 
the occupation; the place of employment; the number in the 
family; and the dates of birth of children of five years and 
under. So far as reports have come from cities, Pittsfield 
originated the use of the symbols to indicate the position of 
the individual in the family, which of course had a very distinct 
bearing upon the proper making-out of prospect cards. 

Still another type of census appears to have been originated 
in Springfield, Mass., and is at once the most elaborate and 
broadest in character. It called, first of all, for the careful 
identification of the census-taker and the census sheets were 
arranged in accordance with addresses. There was a series of 
columns of generous size so that writing would not have to be 
cramped. The first column was headed "Mrs. or Miss", the 
second column was for the family name, the third for the given 
name, and the fourth for the initial. The fifth column was 
for entering the ages of members of the family from sixteen to 
twenty-one; the sixth the number of children under sixteen. 
Then there were successive columns for the home address by 
street and number, place of employment, nature of employment 
or occupation, number of persons from the household in Govern- 
ment service, and finally, in some respects most important, the 
questions: "Are you doing patriotic service? If so, what?" 
The idea was that in this column persons could enter whatever 
they were doing, such as knitting, Red Cross work. Home Guard 
service, etc. It was suggested after the census had been taken 

58 



that it would be a distinct addition if there were another column 
with the heading: "What service would you be willing to do?" 

This census was taken on one Sunday afternoon and in a 
population which is variously estimated from 110,000 to 125,000 
the persons accounted for numbered 96,807. Considering the 
number of persons likely to be out on any given afternoon, this 
was extraordinary, and in the course of the following week 
several thousand nam^es were added by voluntary enrollment. 
There were only 129 people in the entire city who refused to 
answer the questions. 

An idea which was utilized in Springfield, but which could 
well be extended considerably, is to have the letter-carriers serve 
as heads of divisions. They are peculiarly familiar with the 
names, can readily decipher those which are illegible, and can 
correct those which are misspelled. Moreover this gives . an 
opportunity to a body of men who seldom have opportunity to 
express their civic spirit and their interest in the community. 

The census sheet as developed in Springfield was used in a 
very much simplified form by Meriden and Torrington, both of 
which omitted the column with regard to patriotic service and 
substituted a column in which there could be marked a symbol 
to indicate whether the individual earned wages or had an 
income from other sources. This, however, made the census 
much more nearly a war chest affair and to that extent narrow- 
ed its scope. 

The War Chest Association of the Tarrytowns used sepa- 
rate forms for various classes of population, one form being 
for physicians, lawyers, clergymen, and professional people in 
general, another for other classes of occupation, the form of 
the blank being altered in order to meet the requirements of 
different classes. This appears to be a needless complication 
and one which, unless it is desired to divide names among teams 
on a vocational basis, requires more effort than is worth while. 
Certainly in a large city it is sufficiently difficult to instruct 
the public and the enumerators with regard to one blank with- 
out making the situation any more complex. 

The census was also used in certain Ohio cities, usually in a 
form rather simpler than any of those described, provision being 
made simply for the names of adults and wage-earners and their 
addresses. 

To achieve successful results in one day's effort requires 
much thought beforehand, careful organization, and persistent 
instruction both of the public and of enumerators. The most 
elaborate instructions to census-takers were published by 
Springfield, Mass. It nmy be said in general that the ideas 
which have proved most successful in practice are to have an 
extremely large number of census-takers so that each will have 
relatively few to see — thirty being a maximum, perhaps; in 
the second place to see to it that the enumerators are carefully 

59 



drilled in the manner of filling out sheets as well as in the prob- 
lem of avoiding friction with householders ; and in the third 
place to avoid duplication and gaps by making the area which 
each individual is to cover so explicit that mistake is virtually 
impossible. 

This last problem was met by Meriden through the use of 
a guide card, an oblong card about six inches by three inches 
with the name of the street written at the top, and pasted upon 
it a section of the city directory covering the houses that that 
census-taker must reach. This not only instructed him precise- 
ly what houses to approach but also gave the census-taker in 
printed form the names, so that if a family had not moved 
recently the matter of spelling was made very much easier and 
the results more accurate. Other cities added to the guide card 
the feature of having pasted on the reverse side a blue-print 
map of exactly that part of the city which the census-taker in 
question was to cover. 

The use made of the census after its completion by different 
war chests may be said to be of four types. 

The first is to build a prospect list. This was done in most 
complete form by Springfield, where the names of persons with 
occupations away from home were first checked on the census 
sheets by the transfer committee. Then stenographers, who 
had been loaned without charge to the war chest by their em- 
ployers, drew off these names onto individual cards m_ade in 
duplicate. There were 32,000 such. The census sheets were 
then turned over to the revision and classification committee 
which put a red check against the names of individuals who had 
no occupation away from home but who, nevertheless, had in- 
comes. This was the first operation which required the exer- 
cise of judgment, and it required a good deal. The red-checked 
names were then taken off onto cards made in duplicate of a 
form slightly different from that used for the blue-checked 
names. Finally the remaining names were taken off onto Home 
Guard cards, of which there were 27,000, these also in duplicate. 
Thus there was created a prospect list covering substantially 
everyone in the city. At least it was intended to be all-inclu- 
sive and probably came as near being so as was possible. 

The second method of making use of the material on the 
census sheets is that practiced by Terre Haute and Meriden. 
Under their plan the census was used as a means of checking up 
the work of solicitors, the material gathered through the census 
not being transcribed onto cards. The details of this use in 
Meriden may be found elsewhere. It should be said perhaps 
at this point that this plan does not conduce to speed and ease 
of operation during the campaign week and that while the 
Springfield plan involves much more preliminary work, which — 
unless it is volunteer — is very expensive, it does simplify the 
task during the week of the campaign. 

60 



The third method, employed where the whole emphasis was 
laid upon house-to-house solicitation and where the division 
among teams was purely geographical, was to use the census 
sheets themselves as prospect cards. In view of what is said 
elsewhere with regard to reliance upon house-to-house solicita- 
tions, this is deemed an unwise practice. 

The fourth method of using the results of the census is what 
may be called, for convenience, the Ohio method, the census 
being intended to serve a purpose primarily educational. The 
only use made of the cards during the campaign was that after 
scrutiny a committee placed a check against the names of such 
persons as had incomes but no places of employment away from 
home. This built up a list of prospects for the homes division. 
Their census enabled them to reach this relatively small but 
none the less important group and served as a valuable basis for 
checking up results after the campaign was over. 

The census is without question the most complete and accu- 
rate method of building a prospect list. It must not be supposed 
however that even in its fullest development it has no short- 
comings. It requires a tremendous amount of energy and time, 
and, unless great care is exercised, expense. It needs to be done 
long enough before the war chest campaign begins so that the 
solicitors and public will not be tired when the main event takes 
place, and so that there is plenty of opportunity for transcription, 
of names, etc. It requires a great deal of preliminary organiza- 
tion and energetic guidance as well as emphasis upon accuracy 
and thoroughness, if it is to have any value. For unless the 
census is almost one hundred per cent, complete it is worse than 
useless. Poorly done, it is an obstruction to success rather than 
a help. 

At best, mistakes are certain to be numerous because of 
errors on the part of the census-takers and errors in transcrip- 
tion due to illegible writing and to stenographers' errors. Fur- 
thermore, cities which have a commuting body of workers cannoti 
reach through the census all who ought to contribute. Many 
who work in the city but do not live there should make contribu- 
tions to the city war chest, since their income is derived from 
that source and also because they can be more effectively 
reached at their places of employment. This means that one of 
two things, and sometimes both, must be done in order to over- 
come the difficulty. Either the war chest should be miade inclu- 
sive of suburbs and surrounding country, or the census should 
be supplemented and corrected by the use of the pay-rolls of 
factories and stores. Both are advisable. 

In some localities, moreover, the problem of taking the cen- 
sus is almost insurmountable. In one city with a large body of 
unskilled labor, made up chiefly of aliens, it was found necessary 
to have the police department, take the census sheets to the 
boarding-house proprietors and notify them that they would be 

61 



held responsible for properly filling out the blanks. Even when 
that had been completed it was found that between the 5th and 
20th of May there had been, among that element of the popula- 
tion, a thirty per cent, removal. This astonishing percentage 
more or less seriously impaired the value of the work which had 
been done in making up the census. In view of this it was 
suggested that the work of "blue-checking" off the names of 
those with employment away from home by the transfer com- 
mittee should be done with somewhat more discretion, that only 
those employed away from home in establishments so small that 
they would not be approached as groups should be blue-checked 
and transcribed onto prospect cards, and that the remainder 
should be green-checked, instead of blue-checked, and not tran- 
scribed, the solicitation being iriade on the basis of the factory 
pay-roll as a prospect list. This would largely obviate the dif- 
ficulty with regard to commuters, would prevent labor turn-over 
from destroying the usefulness of some prospect cards in the 
period between the census and solicitation, and would save an 
immense am.ount of transcribing without impairing results. 

Other Methods. 

Various methods have been developed for making out a 
prospect list by means other than the patriotic census. A num- 
ber of cities have built their prospect lists on the basis of the 
city directory, using in addition the telephone directory, club 
lists, etc. This has the result in most cases that only the house- 
holder is listed and it is necessary to inquire at the time of the 
campaign whether there are others in the home who should 
contribute. If properly done, the results under this plan are 
successful. It is of interest, however, to remark that in one 
city where there was a new up-to-date directory, which was 
supposed to be accurate, there were as a matter of fact so many 
errors that at the close of the campaign, when suggestions were 
called for, one of the most popular was that an up-to-date direc- 
tory be used. This indicates the fact that the directory method 
is, under the best of circumstances, defective. 

A second method is to build a prospect list on the basis of 
those who have given to previous funds. This was done perhaps 
as carefully as anywhere in Cleveland, which began preparations 
in November for a campaign that was to be staged in May. The 
system of prospect cards, moreover, had been in process of de- 
velopment for two years, so that they were both accurate and 
relatively complete. Northampton, in like manner, built its 
prospect list largely on the basis of those who had given to the 
Red Cross — either for its war fund or for its local chapter — and 
to the Y. M. C. A., Y. W. C. A., K. of C, War Camp Community 
Service, Armenian and Syrian Relief, Polish Relief, Jewish 
Relief, the local churches, and also those who had purchased 

62 



Liberty bonds. This plan facilitates recording on the prospect 
cards what a man has done previously, which serves as an index 
to the rating- committee, if not of what he ought to do, at least 
of what he may be expected to do. 

The third method is to build a prospect list for the war chest 
on the basis of Liberty loan campaign cards, which, in some 
communities, have been very thoroughly worked out and which 
form, therefore, a complete index of those who may be expected 
to give individually outside their places of employment. 

The fourth method was developed by a mid-western city 
which found it necessary to act in haste. The committee sent 
out a letter to all the employers of the city — over two thousand 
in number — and requested that a list be sent in of all officials 
and employees who earned $1,800 or more annually. This list 
was supplemented by reference to those who had contributed in 
the previous money-raising campaign. 

Prospect Cards. 

The material carried on the prospect cards differs consider- 
ably in different localities, some being very much more elaborate 
than others. The prospect card of Youngstowii, Ohio, carried 
only the name and address. These names and addresses were 
not entered on individual cards but in an enrollment book which 
was made out in duplicate and numbered, one copy going to the 
captain and one to the worker. There were spaces for sixty 
names, all for which any single worker was supposed to be 
accountable. These were made out by the captains before the 
campaign opened, over 1250 such cards being made. 

The prospect card of Albany carried, beside the name and 
address, the 'phone number, and the business address of the 
prospect. Coshocton, Ohio, had a prospect card showing the 
name and address, place of emploj^ment, whether married or 
single, number of dependents without income, taxable property,' 
estimated net worth, yearly income, and a place for remarks. 
Batavia, N. Y., carried beside name and address, whether owner 
or tenant, number of acres, occupation, name of employer, 
annual income, property both real and personal, where born, 
whether naturalized or not, the name of the wife, number of 
boys and girls and ages, church affiliation, lodge affiliation. 
Liberty loan subscriptions, and donations to previous war relief 
funds. 

Springfield, Mass., had two types of prospect card. The 
first, for the homes division, was made up to show the ward and 
precinct, street and niunber, the class and serial number, with 
spaces for eight names with the surname, then the first name 
and initial, age, and a column to report subscriptions. This was 
signed by the solicitor together with his team number and divi- 

63 



sion and was made out with carbon duplicate on the typewriter. 
Those who were to be solicited in groups had a card which 
showed the class and serial number, the place of business, name, 
address, occupation ; previous subscriptions to Red Cross, 
Y. M. C. A., K. of C, Jewish Relief, and local hospitals; and 
space to record the subscription or the reason for refusal ; also 
the name of solicitor, his team number and division. There was, 
beside, a space in which a rating could be put. 

When one approaches the problem of answering the ques- 
tion what a prospect card ought to carry, it is obvious that the 
more personal information as to a man's name, address, occupa- 
tion that appears, the more valuable it is to the solicitor in seek- 
ing a subscription. It is well to have it carry some class or 
serial number or both for convenience in recording, so that the 
office force will not have to copy so many names in recording 
which team is responsible for certain prospect cards. It should 
also carry space for the solicitor's name and team number, for 
the amount of the subscription secured and for the reason for 
refusal. The question whether it should carry a space for a 
rating is dealt with in the subsequent section. It is practically 
certain that if it carries a rating it ought not to carry a record 
of previous subscriptions. It is quite proper for the record of 
those subscriptions to be collated for the use of the rating com- 
mittee, but it is not desirable that they should be recorded on a 
card which goes to the solicitor. The difficulty in not doing so, 
however, is a physical one, namely, that it would mean the mak- 
ing out of two sets of cards, one for the use of the rating com- 
mittee and another for the solicitor. 

In the homes division there is not the same need for elabora- 
tion because, as already indicated, the work here is chiefly the 
work of the gleaner and large results cannot be expected. There 
is no reason therefore that this card should not cover a whole 
household, save for those to be reached at their places of employ- 
ment, particularly since the assignment is purely geographical. 

The prospect card should always be made out on a tj^'pe- 
writer with a carbon duplicate to serve as a master list. 
Rochester had a double master list, one made up of the names 
printed alphabetically on sheets fastened on a long counter so 
that workers could see whether names of friends had been 
requisitioned by anyone else. The second master list consisted 
of the duplicates of the cards themselves which were kept in the 
hands of the team secretary. 

Springfield, Mass., had a double master list system. In the 
first place the prospect cards assigned to each team were 
charged against that team at headquarters and in the card con- 
trol book of the regimental secretary. In the second place the 
carbon duplicates were filed alphabetically according to their 
classes in large trays which were built for the purpose. 

64 



Rating. 

iThe discussion of what the prospect card should carry leads 
inevitably to the question whether it should bear the amount 
which the individual is expected to contribute — that is, whether 
the prospective givers should be rated. Difference of opinion 
on this topic is sharp. 

Some cities strongly disapproved the practice. Columbus, 
Ohio, did not use a system of rating and those in charge there 
feel that it created a great deal of good feeling not to do so. 
They believe that the atmosphere created by rating will be bad. 
The method employed in that city was to call in to group meet- 
ings on successive days those who might be expected to give 
fairly large amounts. I'hese were addressed by the vice- 
president of the war chest, Mr. Fred Miller, who pointed out to 
them in a remarkable address the problem which the com- 
munity faced and brought home realization of the fact that if 
Columbus was to succeed in raising $3,000,000 persons of large 
means would have to give at least in accordance with the pub- 
lished scale. Nevertheless, even in Columbus, the prospect 
cards were looked over with the solicitor, who was given some 
idea of how much the man might give, though he was specifically 
and definitely instructed not to mention that amount save inso- 
far as he might do so on the grounds of personal intimacy or in 
response to a confidential question. 

The method was not widely different in Albany. In Albany 
rating was resorted to, but it was done only as an aid to the 
solicitor rather than as a suggestion to the prospective sub- 
scriber. The idea underlying this was that the solicitor is a 
salesman and that he ought to have some guide as to what his 
customer can afford or is likely to want. This information was 
regarded as confidential and was not to be understood as an 
assessment or the levy of a tax. 

In other cases the rating was used very largely as a method 
of classifying the cards in order to assist in the creation of 
competition. This was notably the case in Springfield, Mass. 
The committee in that city discovered that the problem of team 
competition had been growing more difficult. The cards were 
rated, therefore, but not for the purpose of making an assess- 
ment nor even primarily for the use of the solicitor, but in 
order that the teams might have a relatively equal chance in 
competition with one another. Thus the committee on revision 
and classification divided the prospect cards into classes from 
A to F, Class A being made up of large corporations which 
were expected to give $3,000 or more; Class B of banks; Class 
C of individuals of large means who might be expected to make 
contributions of $3,000 or more; Class D of individuals such 
as managers of businesses, superintendents, foremen, mer- 
chants, lawyers, etc., and also small firms, partnerships, and 

65 



small corporations which might be expected to give less than 
$3,000; Class E of employees of large manufacturing, mercan- 
tile, contracting, and banking establishments grouped as a unit 
under the nam.e of the firm; Class F of men and women living 
at home with no places of business outside. This classification 
obviously assisted the work of rating and the larger givers 
were assigned to the so-called "Navj^", making certain that each 
"fleet" got equal amounts of prospects. In like manner indus- 
trial plants were divided so that an equal amount of prospects 
went to each team. This involved a tremendous amount of la- 
bor, but analysis of the totals discloses the fact that it succeed- 
ed in restoring keen competition, 

Springfield not only rated individual cards but also made 
group ratings, which is a very much simpler process. The 
method used was to learn the number of employees and the 
amount of the weekly pay-roll in any given establishment and 
then virtually to apply the sliding scale to the average pay in 
that factory or shop. Thus, a concern with five hundred em- 
ployees who received a total of $10,000 a week and a concern 
with a thousand employees who received only $10,000 a week 
would have an equal group rating, which would mean that the 
employees of the first would be called upon to give an average 
of, say, $24.00 a year while the employees of the second would 
be called upon to give an average of only $12.00 a year. When 
the ratio of employees to the pay-roll was so low that the wages 
were obviously unusually high the employees were called upon 
to give a larger amount in proportion. This, again, was done 
chiefly for purposes of assignment of prospects among teams. 
It was frankly stated that "there will be variations in the re- 
sults obtained of course, as this is not a government assessment 
but a voluntary offering. If, however, the same general ratio 
method is used in assessing all factory groups the spirit of com- 
petition which we desire to foster will be preserved and en- 
couraged between the teams to which these group cards 
eventually go." Experience justified that prediction. 

Utica, N. Y., rated the cards on the basis of a group system, 
sorting them into classes and marking in the corner of each the 
minimum amount which members of that class should contri- 
bute. Some of the individuals there felt that this was not the 
best practice to follow on the ground that class rating has a 
tendency to emphasize the lowest figure within the class, and 
if a man sees that he is in the $5.00 a month class and the next 
above is a $10.00 a month class he is more likely to give $5.00 
a month than $7.00 or $8.00 as he perhaps should. 

The method of reaching the amount which is to be suggest- 
ed on the prospect card differs as widely as the practice of rat- 
ing itself. Sometimes the amount is suggested by the census- 
taker on the basis of his observation of living conditions, etc. 

6Q 



Sometimes it is done by collating the records of previous con- 
tributions and taking a total for the year and adding somewhat 
thereto because of the increased demands. This has the effect 
of rating a man according to his previous generosity or parsi- 
mony rather than his ability. Sometimes it is done by the 
executive committee on the basis of personal acquaintance and 
impressions. The most complete and accurate method was 
used in cities which had a special committee which regard- 
ed the work not as something which they were to do themselves 
but which they were to supervise. In several cities this com- 
mittee enlisted the assistance of bankers, credit men in the 
stores, tax assessors, and numerous others in position to have 
inside information. In consequence, the ratings suggested by 
these experts, which were checked with what the individuals had 
done in previous drives, were extraordinarily accurate. 

Emphasis should be laid at this point upon the fact that 
where rating is done it ought to be done in relation to some total 
— specifically that part of the amount to be raised which the 
wealthier group should contribute. Mr. H. E. Freeman of 
Springfield, Ohio, in the preliminary studies for the campaign 
in that city decided that on the basis of the experience of other 
localities the fund should be raised in approximately the follow- 
ing proportions: 40% from wage-earners, 30% from larger in- 
dividual givers, and 30% from corporations. On this basis he 
analyzed somewhat further and, estimating the number of in- 
comes between various figures, he built a sliding scale which 
would produce the proper percentage, namely, 30% of the quota. 
This work was done equally carefully in certain other cities, 
as will be shown in a subsequent section, but this case illustrates 
the manner in which, if rating is to be done, it should be done, 
that is, with a definite goal in mind and not simply arbitrarily 
or in an effort to get the largest possible amount irrespective of 
what others are called upon to do. 

Where the group quota is fixed thus accurately and where 
the individual ratings are done expertly, there is very little to 
complain of. Indeed most givers, as experience indicates, wel- 
come a suggestion as to what their proper shares may be. A 
published scale of giving is an assistance, but unless it is made 
too complicated to be generally understood it cannot make pro- 
vision for the personal circumstances of an individual. On the 
other hand, rating if done confidentially by able men, is much 
better than a scale because individual circumstances can be 
taken into account. 

My conclusion with regard to this practice is that it must 
be done very tenderly. At best it is making somewhat free 
with a man's private concerns — ^if there are private concerns 
any more. If done it involves an obligation that the card when 
rated by intimate business associates on the basis of confiden- 
tial information shall not be promiscuously handed about but 

67 



shall be assigned only to a discreet person, preferably a friend. 
This involves a very careful program of requisition and assign- 
ment of prospect cards. 

Furthermore the rating should be used primarily for pur- 
poses of distributing the cards among teams; secondarily as an 
assistance to the solicitor in making his sale; and finally, and 
only finally, as a helpful suggestion to the individual. It should 
never be regarded as an assessment or tax. This does not mean, 
of course, that a person notably and conspicuously failing to do 
his share shall not be asked to do more, but it does mean that 
the solicitor shall not insist upon the individual giving the 
amount for which he is rated. 

Suggested Amounts. 

Not everybody can be rated. It is only fair to those who 
are that others should be made acquainted as definitely as pos- 
sible with their responsibilities if the goal of the campaign is to 
be reached. To this end many cities have published a sliding 
scale to serve as a guide, by the use of which the individual 
may determine his equitable share of the community gift. 

As nearly as one can judge these scales have ordinarily 
been based simply upon a general notion of what various classes 
of income ought to produce in the way of gifts. Occasionally 
however an attempt has been made to find a rational basis for 
the scale which is published. In Columbus the committee had 
statistics from the Ohio Department of Labor which showed 
various groups among wage-earners, etc. On the basis of these 
they figured that if everybody in every factory gave at the 
ratio of "one to thirty-one" — i. e., roughly 4% — it would pro- 
duce $720,000. They did not expect everyone to give, nor did 
they expect that all who did give would give 4%. Therefore 
they set the quota of the wage-earners at $400,000. The quotas 
of the other classes were not figured with equal care and the 
results did not entirely justify the estimates which had been 
made. Dayton, Ohio, attempted after having fixed a war chest 
goal to make a distribution among the various classes of the 
community on the basis of wealth, earnings, and other data. 

Detroit took great pains in producing a schedule. The 
committee did no rating at all but depended solely upon the 
published schedule. They made estimates on the basis of mat- 
ter gotten from banking institutions, from factory pay-rolls, 
from Dun and Bradstreet, from the tax list, and from other 
sources of information. From these investigations they esti- 
mated that the income of Detroit was about $350,000,000, that 
about $150,000,000 went to those who earned over $3,000 a year 
and $200,000,000 to the wage group. It was then decided that 
a fair share for the wage-earners, if the total demand was $7,- 
000,000, would be $2,000,000— that is, about 28.6% of the total. 

68 



This is to be contrasted with the 40% figure mentioned in the 
previous section for Springfield, Ohio. When this total of 
$2,000,000 was applied to the wage income it appeared that it 
was roughly 1%, but inasmuch as it was impossible to hope that 
every wage-earner would give, and since it was certain that 
some could not give as much as 1%, the committee, in order to 
reach a 1% average gift for the total wage group, set 2% as the 
norm and published a scale accordingly. This left $5,000,000 
out of $7,000,000 as the share of the capital group, and having 
statistics as to the sorts of income in that group, they made a 
graduated table making no provision, it ought to be pointed 
out, for corporation gifts, which the Springfield, Ohio, estimate 
expected would produce 30% of the total. Youngstown, Ohio, 
after making estimates figured that the pay-rolls amounted to 
about $60,000,000 a year and dividends to about $60,000,000 a 
year. The committee then decided that the wage group should 
pay about 33 1-3% of the total and the capital group 66 2-3%. 
This amounted, roughly, to 1% of the pay-roll and 2% of the 
dividends, but there was not the same effort as in Detroit to 
graduate the scale accurately among the various classes of the 
capital group. 

It is interesting to check these estimates with what was 
actually produced. In Columbus the wage group produced 
something like 36% of the total amount and the average gift 
appears to have been about 2% of a normal wage, or a trifle 
under. In Rome the wage group produced 22% of the total 
gift, 80% of the total number of givers, and the average gift 
appears to have been something like 1.3% of a normal wage. 
In Rochester the wage group produced 27% of the total amount, 
72% of the number of givers, and the average gift was about 
1.5% of an average income. In Utica 36% of the total gift came 
from employees. In Springfield, Ohio, 48% came from employ- 
ees, as against an expectation of 40%. Corporations, however, 
appear to have produced not over 20%, as against an expecta- 
tion of 30%. Dayton, Ohio, set the expectation from wage- 
earners at ^bout 35% and the realization was about 54% in 
amount. 72% of the number of givers were in the wage group. 
Anaconda, Mont., produced 62% of the total amount of its gift 
from the wage group. These figures thus thrown together are 
obviously not precisely comparable, because different cities de- 
fine the term "wage-earners" somewhat differently, though in 
general they include factory, store, utility, and public employ- 
ees. Variations in the figures, moreover, are caused by the 
different types of communities. In some communities the wage 
group is far more predominant than in others. Again, the dif- 
ferences in the figures reflect the variant distribution of de- 
mand upon the several classes of the giving public in different 
cities. Nevertheless, despite their rough character and despite 
the fact that many allowances have to be made, the figures have 

69 



a real significance for cities which are planning war chests and 
serve as an index to expectation. 

It may be worth while also to give a tabulation of sub- 
scriptions by amounts in one or two cities in order to furnish 
some index of normal distribution. In Syracuse the result of 
tabulation as of July 2, 1917, was as follows: 



Subscriptions 


Number 


Amount 


$ 0.25 


97 


$ 24.25 


.50 


139 


69.50 


1.00 


530 
766 


530.00 


Total 


$623.75 


$ 1.20 


88 


$105.60 


1.80 


7 


12.60 


2.00 


164 


328.00 


2.40 


96 


230.40 


3.00 


952 


2,856.00 


3.60 


3 


10.80 


4.00 


27 


108.00 


4.80 


109 


523.20 


5.00 


520 


2,600.00 


6.00 


1,769 


10,614.00 


7.20 


46 


331.20 


9.00 


260 


2,340.00 


12.00 


22,336 


268,032.00 


13.00 


2,058 


26,754.00 


Total 


28,435 


$314,845.80 


$ 15.00 


77 


1,155.00 


18.00 


134 


2,412.00 


24.00 


1,620 


38,880.00 


30.00 


81 


2,430.00 


36.00 


246 


8,856.00 


Total 


2,158 


$ 53,733.00 


$ 48.00 


275 


13,200.00 


60.00 


865 


51,900.00 


72.00 


23 


1,656.00 


84.00 


7 


588.00 


96.00 


79 


7,584.00 


120.00 


412 


49,440.00 


Difference 


in Odd Amounts 


8,028.98 


Total 


1,661 


$132,396.98 



70 



Subscriptions 


Number 


Amount 


$ 144.00 


53 


7,632.00 


200.00 


54 


10,800.00 


240 . 00 


60 


14,400.00 


300.00 


130 


39,000.00 


323.20 


1 


323.20 


360.00 


6 


2,160.00 


400.00 


3 


1,200.00 


420.00 


2 


840.00 


480.00 


7 


3,360.00 


500.00 


20 


10,000.00 


Difference 


in Odd Amounts 


8,028.98 


Total 


336 


$ 97,744.18 


$ 600.00 


42 


$ 25,200.00 


700.00 


1 


700.00 


800.00 


2 


1,600.00 


900.00 


6 


5,400.00 


1,000.00 


17 


17,000.00 


Total 


68 


$ 49,900.00 


p 1,200.00 


39 


46,800.00 


1,303.30 


1 


1,303.30 


1,500.00 


2 


3,000.00 


1,800.00 


5 


90,000.00 


2,000.00 


5 


10,000.00 


2,400.00 


9 


21,600.00 


2,500.00 


2 


5,000.00 


3,000.00 


8 


24,000.00 


3,600.00 


2 


7,200.00 


4,000.00 


1 


4,000.00 


4,800.00 


2 


9,600.00 


5,000.00 


4 


20,000.00 


Total 


80 


$161,503.80 


5 6,000.00 


7 


42,000.00 


7,000.00 


1 


7,000.00 


7,500.00 


2 


15,000.00 


8,650.00 


1 


8,650.00 


9,000.00 


1 


9,000.00 


10,000.00 


2 


20,000.00 


Total 


14 


$101,650.00 



71 



Subscriptions 

$12,000.00 
24,000.00 
25,000.00 
30,000.00 



Total 



Number 

9 
2 
1 
1 



Amount 

108,000.00 
48,000.00 
25,000.00 
30,000.00 



13 



Special Bank Dividends 
Grand Total 



$211,000.00 
36,000.00 

$1,159,397.01 



In Salem, Mass., the result as of May 31, 1918, for monthly 
subscriptions only, was as follows: 



Subscriptions 

.50 

.75 
1.00 



Total 



Number 

1161 

535 
2 

6756 



Total 


8454 


1.25 


9 


1.50 


57 


1.75 


1 


2.00 


332 


2.50 


38 


3.00 


78 


3.25 


2 


3.33 


2 


3.34 


1 


3.50 


2 


4.00 


39 


4 . 50 


2 


4.70 


1 


5.00 


204 


6.00 


11 


7.00 


3 


7.50 


1 


8.00 


9 


8.50 


1 


10.00 


84 


12.00 


2 


12.50 


8 



882 



Am.ount 

$ 290.25 

267.50 

1.50 

6,756.00 



$ 7,315.25 



11.25 

85.50 

1.75 

664.00 

95.00 

219.00 

6.50 

6.66 

3.34 

7.00 

156.00 

9.00 

4.70 

1,020.00 

66.00 

21.00 

7.50 

72.00 

8.50 

840.00 

24.00 

100.00 



$ 3,428.70 



72 



Subscriptions 


Number Amount 




15.00 


19 285 . 00 




16.00 


2 32.00 




20.00 


14 280.00 




20.75 


1 20.75 




21.00 


1 21.00 




25.00 


35 875.00 




30.00 


6 180.00 




35.00 


4 140.00 




37.50 


2 75 . 00 




40.00 


2 80.00 




45.00 


1 45.00 




Total 


87 % 


2,033.75 


$ 50.00 


17 850.00 




60.00 


3 180.00 




75.00 


2 150.00 




100.00 


13 1,300.00 




125.00 


1 125.00 




Total 


36 $ 


2,605.00 


$ 200.00 


3 $ 600.00 




250.00 


4 1,000.00 




300.00 


3 900.00 




500.00 


3 1,500.00 




Total 


13 $ 


4,000.00 




Difference in Odd Amounts $ 
Grand Total % 


419.00 




19,801.70 



In making up scales it is probably not possible, nor is it 
advisable, to have absolute uniformity among communities 
which adopt war chests. In each individual case there should be 
a careful statistical study along the lines suggested in the cases 
of Springfield, Ohio, and Detroit. This requires a man or 
group of men of large ability and much patience. In the sec- 
ond place, care must be taken to set the demand upon labor low 
enough and the demand upon capital high enough so as not to 
alienate the mass of givers. It should be remembered, too, that 
this scale ought to be drawn on such a basis that in the pres- 
sure for 100% subscriptions among working men no serious 
hardship will be wrought. There is no benefit — there is indeed 
real harm — in taking subscriptions for larger amounts than 
the subscribers ought to give. It is further desirable and nec- 
essary when a schedule is published that it be made absolutely 

73 



clear that it is not an income tax but simply a helpful sugges- 
tion ; and it is unwise to incorporate in the pledge card a state- 
ment to the effect that the pledge is such and such a per cent, 
of the individual's income because that would be inequitable 
in certain cases. Instead the plan should be followed which has 
been used in many cities, namely, to make an explicit statement 
that the table is for suggestive purposes only. York, Pa., pub- 
lished a scale of great flexibility, showing for example that 
earnings from $65.00 to $100.00 a month should produce in 
normal cases from $8.00 to $18.00 a year and the committee 
published with the scale the following statement : 

"Remember that we do not mean to fix contributions from indi- 
viduals, employers, or employees. That would be absurd or at least 
subject to just resentment. But we do mean that contributions by 
employees, employers, and people of independent means will have to 
average something like what is indicated in order to obtain the full 
quota due from York and York County for war relief work.* * * Due 
allowance must always be made for large families of small children, 
and for sickness, and sometimes for both. So that many who have 
fewer dependents will necessarily have to give generously and patriot- 
ically more than would otherwise be their proportion." 

Ordinarily the published statement is not quite so explicit but 
the York statement furnishes a fair example of what does per- 
vade most and should pervade all. Rochester covered still an- 
other point by saying at the end of its scale: 

"It is perfectly well known to the comimunity that there are many 
people in Rochester who have been giving in larger proportions than 
the above standard and will continue to do so. The public should there- 
fore distinctly understand that the contribution list when published 
does not furnish a key to the subscriber's income." 

There has been a good deal of discussion concerning wheth- 
er schedules ought to be put at a higher figure than the normal 
contribution can be expected to be or whether they should pre- 
sent an accurate reflection of the statistical studies. It has 
been insisted by some that the "one to thirty-one" slogan, which 
calls for 4%, is a mark to be shot at rather than a practicable 
ideal. As already indicated, the workmen of Columbus appear 
to have given an average of about 2% of their wages, which 
would tend to substantiate to that extent the argument that 
the "one to thirty-one" slogan represents a very heavy demand. 
On the other hand, the advocates of the 4% basis feel that it has 
good psychological value, that it lends itself so remarkably to 
the appeal that it ought to be retained, and that it is, moreover, 
a move in the direction of bringing the public to understand the 
sacrifices which are going to be necessary as the war assumes 
for America a more acutely personal stage. 

74 



On the other hand, Detroit, Rochester, and certain other 
cities attempted to build scales, not as marks to be shot at, but 
as practical possibilities. From this point of view it seems 
fair on the basis of experience to say that the 2% minimum is 
realized in practice better than the 4%. 

Springfield, Mass., in publishing a sliding scale did not do 
it entirely officially. At the beginning of the campaign there 
was no such scale, but a group of individuals got together, drew 
up a scale and signed it. It was then published with the state- 
ment. "The undersigned, with the sole desire of establishing 
for himself and for others an equitable basis of giving, endorses 
the following schedule and in his ovv^n case agrees to be bound 
to give the percentage of his income as called for in this table." 
It was drawn by a group of men of large means, and scrutiny 
of it will demonstrate that it rises at a fairly rapid rate, so that 
they cannot be accused of attempting to dodge their responsibili- 
ties. This plan was effective in giving the scale prestige and 
reality. The same end has been attained in other cities by hav- 
ing all those who became solicitors agree to give in accordance 
with the schedule. It is worth while, wherever possible, to 
adopt some such means as these to give the scale greater authori- 
ty or influence than its simple publication will ensure. 

When one attempts to collate the various scales which have 
been published it appears that there is a great variety. Look- 
ing first at the minimum request, which may roughly be said 
to be that which is asked from the wage-earner, it appears that 
there is variation all the way from 1/2% to 4%. Kalamazoo 
called for only 1/2%, Sheboygan for %%>. Most of those which 
reported used 1%, Ashland 114% and two cities 1V2%- A 
number of cities, including some of the most successful, among 
them Detroit and Rochester, adopted 2%. Kane, Pa., used 3% 
and several, including Columbus, Indianapolis, Philadelphia, 
Springfield, Mass., and Springfield, Ohio, 4%. 

A study of the relative speed with which these various 
schedules rise shows that there is as great difference in this 
matter as in the matter of the minimum. Some cities have 
simply a flat rate. Albuquerque, N. M., appears to have asked 
for 1% from everyone whatever his income might be. Ely, 
Minn., appears to have asked everyone, irrespective of income, 
to give $1.00 a month. Norwalk, Ohio, called for an hour a 
week, which is not a flat rate only if it is assumed that people 
of higher income work a less number of hours than those of 
less income. 

In order to get a rough standard one may say that those 
are slow-rising which reach 5% at $20,000. Such cities are 
Akron, Ambridge (which has a 3% maximum). Anaconda, Bur- 
lington, Crawfordsville, Dayton, and Detroit. Others are very 
much more rapid in the ascent and call for 10% at $10,000. 

75 



Such are Albany, Ashland, Indianapolis, Meriden, Rome, Salem, 
and others. These are mentioned simply as examples, for there 
are many more. It indicates, however, the diversity which is, 
with all proper allowance for variant conditions in individual 
localities, somewhat greater than the situation warrants if the 
burden is to be equitably distributed. 

In many cases a special effort has been made to give a 
separate index with regard to what farmers should do. Albion, 
Mich., figured that the farmers should give 20c a month on 
each $1,000 worth of property, but reported after the campaign 
that this figure had not proved wholly satisfactory in operation. 
Coshocton, Ohio, called upon the farmers to give 1% of their 
total taxable property. Crawfordsville, Indiana, stated that 
"where the income from farm land cannot be distinctly deter- 
mined the contribution shall be not less than 25c per acre." 
Houghton, Mich., published a scale on the basis of acreage which 
read as follows: 

"Forty acres partially cleared, 25c.; forty acres cleared and culti- 
vated, 50c.; forty to eighty acres partially cleared, 50c.; forty to eighty 
acres almost all cleared and cultivated, 75c.; eighty acres or over par- 
tially cleared and cultivated, $1.00. The above amounts- are the mini- 
mum subscriptions expected and pledges for more than $1.00 per month 
will be welcomed." 

Newberry, Mich., called for farmers to give at least $5.00 a year 
and an additional amount in proportion to the valuations of 
clearings, which was to be set by each local committee for its 
own group. Sheboygan published the statement that "farmers 
are to contribute on the basis of their assessed valuation of prop- 
erty and other sources of income, after making due allowance 
for special conditions and indebtedness, at a rate of percentage 
to be determined by each township." 

Inquiry as to the number of individuals who lived up to the 
scale in making their subscriptions shows that in general — as 
would be expected — the more conservatively drawn scales 
brought larger percentages of those who gave as much or more 
than the scale called for than did those which were more radical 
in their drafting. 

There is one objection to the publication of a schedule 
which is urged in many cities, namely, that it has a tendency if 
drawn on the basis of calling for amounts which may be reason- 
ably expected in normal cases to put the emphasis on the min- 
imum in each group. A number of cities have warned that 
carelessness in the statement with regard to the schedule had 
led people whose circumstances were such that they were able 
to give beyond it to neglect to do so. On the other hand, cities 
which were more careful in their statements indicate that this 
difficulty can be avoided. 

76 



The general conclusion therefore must be that the sliding 
scale is valuable in proportion to the care exercised in its draft- 
ing, the tact with which it is presented, and the manner in which 
it is combined with other methods, whether memberships, or 
ratings, or appeals on the basis of time. 

Basis of Pledge. 

Closely integrated with the subject of suggested amounts 
is the matter of the basis of the pledge. 

Many cities, as indicated in the previous section, publish 
sliding scales. Normally this is done only as a suggestion. 
Occasionally, however, subscribers are asked to make a pledge 
that they are giving in accordance with the published schedules, 
which makes them not merely suggested amounts but actual 
bases for pledges. Where this has been carried to its logical 
conclusion it has reduced the m.atter practically to becoming 
a tax. Fortunately this is done in only very few cities. 

Some war chests ask their subscribers to make their pledges 
on the basis of time, the ordinary time being one-half hour or 
one hour a week. Those using an hour are, among others, 
Akron, Ohio, Billings, Mont., Cumberland, Md., Lockport, 
N. Y., Rochester, N. Y. Among those using one-half hour are 
Batavia, 111., Burlington, Iowa, Butte, Mont., Elkhart, Ind., 
Kenosha, Wis., Michigan City, Ind., Newberry, Racine, Wis., 
Sycamore, 111., Tonawanda, N. Y., and Youngstown, 0. One 
community, Newark, N. Y., uses one and one-half hours as the 
basis of its giving. These of course are readily reduced to 
percentages. Roughly speaking, the one-half hour represents 
1%, an hour 2%, and an hour and a half 3%. Most 
of the cities which use this time advertising do it only as a 
suggestion or in combination with other plans. But a few 
make the pledge rest upon this exclusively and in such cases it is 
no longer a suggested amount but the real basis of pledge. 

A few cities have used the time slogan expressed in terms 
of days. Columbus originated the "one to thirty-one" slogan, 
which calls upon a man to give one day's pay each month. That 
plan has been followed by most of the cities which make their 
appeals on the basis of days, for example, by Newark, Ohio, 
Oil City, Pa., Philadelphia, Sidney, Ohio, and Springfield, Vt. 
Ambridge, Pa., used the idea of four days a year, one day a 
quarter, i. e., "one to ninety-one." These, like the hour slogan, 
are readily translated into percentages ; one to thirty-one being 
practically 4% and four days a year being 1%, roughly. Usual- 
ly these are simply employed as methods of suggesting amounts. 
Only rarely is either of them made the real basis for the pledge. 

Many cities make the basis of their pledge an agreement 
to join a membership association. These memberships are nor- 
mally $1.00 a month, though there are a few instances, as for 

77 



example Montpelier, Vt., and Westbrook, Me., where the mem- 
bership fee is 50c. a month. In all but one or two cases the 
pledge consists in an agreement to take out a certain number 
of memberships. In one case however a person was asked to 
take out only one membership. 

Usually when an individual takes out a number of mem- 
berships he receives only one vote in the association, regardless 
of the number of memberships for which he may have sub- 
scribed. Occasionally, however, every individual is given as 
many votes in the association as he has memberships. 

In several instances the membership plan is the sole re- 
liance of the organization. Ordinarily, however, where this is 
made the basis of the pledge some other means of suggesting 
the amount which the individual ought to give is adopted, either 
a sliding scale showing percentage of income, or an amount of 
time, or a rating. In such cases as these latter there is occa- 
sionally no definite membership fee but all subscribers become 
members. Illustrations of such cases are Attleboro and Spring- 
field, Mass. 

Other cities have adopted other names, which amount prac- 
tically to a membership basis of the pledge. Brattleboro, Vt., 
calls its memberships ^'enlistments". Ilion and Mohawk speak 
of "shares". These all amount in practice to the membership 
plan. 

A few cities had special memberships for children. For 
this Attleboro worked out a somewhat elaborate plan. In 
Springfield, Mass., the idea was improvised during the cam- 
paign. Some, for example Sheboygan, set a minimum subscrip- 
tion for children from six to twelve years of 50c. a year and 
from twelve to sixteen years of $1.00 a year. The Tarrytown^ 
had a junior membership for those under twenty-one years of 
age of $4,00, no other amount being allowed, either more or less. 
Westbrook, Maine, had a children's membership of 50c. One 
or two have had a sliding scale by which those in the higher 
grades paid more than those in the lower. 

Many cities have adopted none of the foregoing bases for 
their pledges but simply call for an offering without relation 
to memberships, percentages, or any other fixed plan. They 
may publish appeals of various sorts with amounts suggested 
but they have no basis on which the pledge is taken. 

The conclusions which have been reached as a result of 
the study of the material which has come in on this subject are, 
in the first place, that the straight membership plan is on the 
whole one of doubtful value, particularly when used exclusively 
and with a definite amount, although it ought to be said at once 
that Syracuse succeeded under those circumstances. It seems, 
however, that there is a tendency under this plan, which was 
revealed even in Syracuse the first year and which has been 

78 



evident in other places, to over-emphasize the $1.00 subscrip- 
tion. It is not, on the other hand, a bad plan to have a mem- 
bership association on the plan adopted by Attleboro and Spring- 
field, Mass., where all subscribers became members. This 
opens the way for popular control for which, though it does 
not yet appear to have been needed in any city, it is wise to 
provide. Under this plan all members should have equal vot- 
ing privileges irrespective of the amount subscribed. 

The conclusions with regard to the wisdom of publishing 
a sliding scale as a suggestion for giving have been set forth in 
detail under the preceding section. It may be said that such 
a scale has not the same value as the basis of pledge. Its use 
in that maijner reduces the subscription virtually to a tax, pre- 
cludes proper variation for individual circumstances, and for 
these and other reasons which readily suggest themselves is 
distinctly unwise. The use of time or a number of days as a 
suggestion for giving has the advantage of being a simple way 
of expressing percentages. It lends itself readily to advertis- 
ing and publicity generally. When, on the other hand, it is 
used as a basis of pledge it opens the way for the patriotic half- 
hour or hour of special exercises in the schools and serves as 
a method of keeping public interest alive. It makes for uni- 
formity in everyone's giving, though this is of doubtful value 
because it involves the abandonment of the principle of grad- 
uated giving, unless the half-hour or hour or day slogan is used 
simply for the wage earners and careful rating or a sliding scale 
is used for those with incomes above those of the wage earning 
class. This plan has, moreover, the weakness that in some in- 
stances it will fail to allow sufficiently for individual circum- 
stances. Where adopted, therefore, caution must be exercised 
to see that it is not pushed too far. In one Middle Western city 
this caution was neglected in a few factories, the consequence 
being that some subscribers later asked the war chest officers 
to allow them to reduce the amounts of their subscriptions, 
requests which were promptly acceded to. The use of this plan 
also develops certain problems of bookkeeping and collecting — 
for example how to figure out the amount of money made in a 
given hour, etc., which is dealt with under the heading, "The 
Patriotic Half Hour." 

The question of whether or not a minimum amount should 
be set has been very much debated. Those in control of the 
war chest in Syracuse feel very strongly that whoever cannot 
afford to give $1.00 a month ought not to be asked to give at all, 
though they may be permitted to do so. Some cities will not 
even permit a gift of less than $12.00 a year. On the other 
hand, the matter of a minimum was very thoroughly thrashed 
out in Rochester and the conclusion was reached that in many 
cases, particularly those of girls employed in department stores, 
telephone exchanges, etc., who are already buying Liberty Bonds 

70 



and War Savings Stamps, it is unfair to ask them to give $1.00 
a month or in some cases even 50c. a month. Yet the commit- 
tee did not want to deprive them of participation in the great 
community enterprise and, in consequence they set no minimum. 
It seems to be a reasonable conclusion that collection at the 
source, which renders delinquency practically impossible and 
which also simplifies bookkeeping, makes it less necessary for 
the enforcement of a minimum among the wage group. For 
the general public it is perhaps wise to have a published mini- 
mum but to accept gifts for less amounts from those who can- 
not afford to give that much and to accept no other gifts, every- 
one giving as much as the published minimum being required to 
make out his subscription card. Those who give less than 
$12.00 should have neither button nor window card nor be en- 
rolled as members. This plan avoids encouragement of too 
small giving, yet does not exclude those of slender means from 
participation. 

Form of Contribution. 

Broadly speaking, there are just two forms of contribution 
to the war chest. The first is an outright gift and the second 
a subscription. A number of places have forbidden the accept- 
ance of gifts under the operation of the slogan "stand up and 
be counted." Some cities have gone so far as to return anony- 
mous gifts because they believe if people are allowed to dis- 
charge their obligations without putting themselves on record, 
the result would be that many would fail to do all they should. 
This practice was followed by Albany, Cleveland, Rochester, 
Springfield, 0., and few other places that reported. In general, 
however, cities have allowed gifts to be made, though a few 
of them reported that they did not regard it as desirable and 
regretted having done so. One city allowed gifts from those 
who were not regular residents. Others "threw the town open" 
in the last day or two of the drive and accepted gifts. Cleve- 
land was an instance of that. Easton, Pa., took up general 
collections at the big war chest set up in the square. One day 
the big chest was put on a truck and sent around the city and 
towards the latter part of the campaign girls with miniature 
war chests stood on the streets to accept gifts. Other cities 
allowed gifts from clubs and lodges. This is a plan of extremely 
doubtful value because it gives individuals an opportunity to 
say they have subscribed through their club, though they may 
have done very little. In other cases it makes men subscribe 
twice. It is not improper to use clubs, etc., as collection agen- 
cies but all subscriptions should be individual subcriptions, save 
in the cases of corporations or businesses. Two or three cities, 
notably Syracuse and Dundee, allowed gifts only from those who 
could not afford one dollar a month. They did not want to 
deprive such people of a part in the community effort and while 

80 



such givers were not enrolled as members of the association 
and were not given a pin or window card, the gift was neverthe- 
less gratefully accepted. 

Occasionally there is a person who wishes to make a really 
sacrificial gift but who does not wish to sign a subscription 
paper or have the matter known. The number of legitimate 
cases of this sort in any town is usually very small. Neverthe- 
less a few cities took pains to meet the desires of such by allow- 
ing them to put the pledge card, when filled out, in an envelope 
marked "confidential", which was not to be opened by the solici- 
tor nor was the name to be published, though the amount had 
to be known to the executive committee and might come under 
the hand of the revision committee who, in turn, might take up 
the matter with the subscriber. Another city, Racine, did not 
take quite such elaborate means but had a space on the pledge 
card where a person who objected to having his name put in the 
paper might put a cross to indicate his desire. 

A study of the evidence convinces one that the emphasis 
should be put on subscription and not on gifts. This does not 
prevent one from making his entire payment at once but it does 
mean that it should be possible for the executive committee, at 
all events, to know the names of contributors and the amounts. 
To that end it is advisable to prohibit gifts save in such in- 
stances where a person is not able to give the minimum amount, 
if one is set. In such cases a gift should not be solicited but 
should be permitted. 

A large number of cities take weekly subscriptions and a 
few limit all subscribers to the weekly plan. On the whole, 
this seems undesirable because it involves a great deal of book- 
keeping and considerable nuisance to individuals who make 
payments with a consequent tendency to delinquency. 

Practically all war chests provide for subscriptions on a 
monthly basis and a considerable number do not allow any other 
form. The reasons advanced for the use of monthly payments 
exclusively are, first, that in every case a man will be able to 
give more if his payments are distributed throughout the year 
than if he makes but a single payment or two or four payments. 
This argument is unsound since persons who derive their in- 
comes from investment frequently find themselves better able 
to pay quarterly, semi-annually or even annually. The second 
reason for employing monthly pledges exclusively is that in case 
more money is raised by the war chest than necessary, the 
executive committee may suspend payment in any given month 
until demand catches up to supply and in order to have this 
operate fairly in every case there must be a single uniform 
method of subscription. 

To some extent it may be argued that the same is true if 
a war chest finds its resources inadequate and is compelled to 
make a new campaign within a year. It seems sufficiently 

81 



clear, however, that those who adopt annual, or semi-annual, or 
quarterly payments are those best able to give and that, con- 
sequently, no very severe injustice will be wrought. There is 
therefore no adequate reason why subscriptions should be taken 
exclusively on a monthly basis, especially since the Crawfords- 
ville plan of omitting a payment has not been extensively follow- 
ed and is not likely to be, particularly when the duration of the 
pledge is but a single year. It should be noted that this report 
recommends that over-subscriptions be made in case there is a 
surplus which practically destroys the basis for this practice. 

Very few war chests have laid any emphasis on semi-an- 
nual payments but several have put a very large amount of 
stress on annual payments. Usually in this latter case the 
subscriptions have been taken on som^e other basis and then a 
campaign staged, after the subscription lists have been com- 
pleted, to encourage all those who can to pay up the entire face 
of their subscriptions at once, both to simplify bookkeeping and 
to prevent any possibility of delinquency. Various odd periods 
of payment have been adopted, such as ten equal payments or 
two installments, but not semi-annual, or four installments, 
but not quarterly. These are simply sporadic instances. 

Broadly speaking, it seems that when the emphasis is put 
on subscription as against gift, a great deal of latitude should 
be allowed between monthly, quarterly, semi-annual, and annual 
payments. The more payments are broken up in this way, the 
simpler the bookkeeping will be because the number of trans- 
actions will be materially reduced. 

Pledge Forms. 

There is no uniform or standard pledge. While one may, 
by careful sorting, discover certain families among the pledge 
cards each running back to some common ancestor among the 
earlier war chests, individuals within these families show mark- 
ed differences in foiiii and spirit. Pledges may roughly be 
grouped into three categories; first, those which constitute a 
binding legal obligation, second, a simple subscription, and 
third, those of an enlistment type. 

It develops that the legal form of pledge has been used in 
only a small percentage of cities, among them, however, Cleve- 
land, Dayton, Indianapolis, Philadelphia, and others almost as 
well known. This form has certain advantages. It has the 
advantage of making the subscriber understand at the outset 
that he is undertaking a real obligation ; it has the advantage at 
the other end of calling to the mind of any who may have signed 
subscriptions in bad faith that they are not entirely free to re- 
pudiate their pledges. 

Some of these pledges of legal form can be collected from 
a man's estate in case he should die before the expiration of the 

82 



period mentioned on the face of the pledge. Others of them, 
however, make a definite statement that they shall be cancelled 
in case of the death and occasionally, also, the removal of the 
subscriber. 

Turning to the second general form, namely, a straight 
subscription, it may be said that a smaller percentage use this 
than would normally be expected, perhaps, because committees 
have been eager, even in the matter of pledge forms, to empha- 
size the patriotic character of the war chest. 

A good many of this type carry the privilege of cancellation 
as do one or two of those of legal form and some of the enlist- 
ment type. This practice of allowing an individual to sign a 
card which specifically reserves the privilege of cancelling his 
pledge, emphasizes the voluntary nature of the subscription and 
destroys any shadow of serious pressure in most cases. Pledge 
cards which provide for cancellation are, among others, Attle- 
boro, Lexington, Melrose, and Northampton, Mass., Kenosha 
and Racine, Wis. 

The third form, the enlistment type, frequently reads some- 
thing as follows : "I hereby pledge my patriotism and service 
to the cause of my country and my moral support to the ob- 
jects and aims of the war chest." This type is distinctly the 
most popular and shows the greatest similarity among the va- 
rious forms in w^hich it appears. 

There is as much variation in detail as there is in the gen- 
eral form of pledge cards. It appears that perhaps one half 
contain an authorization to the executive committee or other 
body to expend the amount subscribed as their judgment may 
dictate. The wording is varied somewhat in different cities 
but normally runs about as follows: "I hereby authorize the 
executive committee of the war chest to expend my subscrip- 
tion for such war needs as to them seems best." If proper by- 
laws have been drawn up in advance, any such authorization is 
unnecessary, particularly if the war chest is organized as a 
membership association, but it is by no means unwise to include 
it. 

The pledge card always ought to carry conspicuously on its 
face the varieties of payment which are possible for the indi- 
vidual. Perhaps a majority provide such an option. Occasion- 
ally it is done by having a separate pledge form for each man- 
ner of payment. Frequently it is done simply by leaving a 
blank, a plan which is not v/holly to be commended inasmuch 
as the purpose of the blank is not always obvious to many sub- 
scribers and many more are careless in filling in blanks. Some 
cards" have the various possibilities — annually, semi-annually, 
quarterly, and monthly — printed along in a straight line in or- 
dinary type, and request the subscriber to cross out those which 
are not needed. This has the disadvantage of not being suf- 
ficiently conspicuous ; subscribers too frequently neglect tO' do 

83 



as asked. Probably the best method, one used in a large num- 
ber of cities, is to print this option separately in a conspicuous 
position where one can checkmark one of the four possibilities. 

One or two allow only weekly payments, a number only 
monthly, one or two only quarterly, and one semi-annually. As 
pointed out elsewhere, the best plan is to allow^ an option among 
annual, semi-annual, quarterly, and monthly payments but to 
exclude weekly payments. 

A large majority of the cities provide on the face of one 
or other of their pledge forms an authorization to the employer 
to deduct the amount of the pledge from the employee's pay 
envelope. Two or three cities have adopted the plan of having 
separate coupon for this authorization attached to the regular 
pledge card. This was done in Amsterdam and Utica. In the 
latter city some of those in charge believed it would be wise in 
adopting this plan to use good stock and rule the back of the 
authorization coupon so that it could be used as a record card 
to be kept by the factory. This idea is one of considerable 
merit because, in the first place, it allows the war chest head- 
quarters to keep the original pledge card in its own file and 
at the same time leave to the factory a proper card on which 
it may record the deductions so that in case a man leaves their 
employ and the factory record is sent to the war chest office 
as part of the labor turnover program, all such cards will be 
unifonn. In the second place it is conspicuously fair because 
it requires separate signature on the part of the workman and 
there is no chance that he will overlook the authorization in the 
considerable body of printing on the regular pledge card. 

Some of the pledge cards specify how often the deduction is 
to be made. Most of them state that it is to be made weekly, 
a few monthly, and some give an option. The matter of proper 
practice in this regard is dealt with elsewhere but in general 
it may be said that if the deduction is to be made each pay day 
and the money sent to the war chest but once a month, careful 
statement is requisite because of the fact that in some months 
there are more than four pay days and it is not wise to ask 
the factories to deduct, one fifth each week in those months. 
The statement needs therefore to be sufficiently explicit so the 
workman will not be led to think there will be a deduction fifty 
two weeks in the year instead of forty eight and so that the 
paymaster, on the other hand, vfill not be left in doubt whether 
he m.ust take out one fifth of the monthly pledge each pay day 
in those months or simply one quarter on four of the pay days 
and nothing on the fifth. The pledge therefore should be on 
the monthly basis, the deduction made each pay day, save when 
there are five in the month, in which case there should be four 
deductions. 

Certain of the pledge forms provide for collection by labor 
unions. The form for this requires no comment as the practice 

84 



of making use of unions as collection agencies is dealt with in 
another place. 

A number of cities have printed on their pledge forms a 
percentage or period of time as the basis of contribution. For 
reasons set forth in other places in this report, that practice 
is not desirable. Its operation has been somewhat limited but 
it is fair to say that some successfully conducted war chests 
have used it. 

A relatively small number of war chests offer on the pledge 
form an option between subscribing for the period of the war 
or for one year. In view of the discussion elsewhere in this 
report to the effect that taking pledges for the duration of the 
war is unwise, this needs no further comment. 

Occasionally the matter of Red Cross membership is in- 
corporated on the pledge card. In one or two instances the 
statement is made that the first dollar paid is to take care of 
the membership ; in another case the statement is made that 
membership shall follow after the third dollar is paid. In one 
instance for every two dollars paid an individual may designate 
membership for someone, presumably a member of his family. 
In view of what is said elsewhere, it seems wise to leave any 
reference to this off the pledge card. 

A very considerable num.ber of cities have ruled the backs 
of the pledge cards in order to use them as ledger cards. The 
objections to this plan are set forth elsewhere and need not be 
reviewed here. Still other cities have used the backs of pledge 
cards as prospect cards, a plan which is not advisable since they 
may carry confidential information which it is not always de- 
sirable that the prospect should see, and because they may need 
to be used again in other connections where it would be distinct- 
ly undesirable to pass out pledge cards lest they be lost or rum- 
pled. On the whole, therefore, it seems better to have a pros- 
pect card separate from the pledge form. 

A few cities have numbered their subscription cards from 
various motives, one using an attached coupon with identical 
number as a receipt for money collected, others plan to use them 
for ledger cards. The use of numbered cards, however, par- 
ticularly in cities of considerable size, involves a great many 
difficulties and is not worth the effort involved. It may be- 
come desirable to number them for various purposes after the 
subscription has been taken, but there appears to be no good 
reason for sending them out numbered. 

Many cities provide for making a carbon copy of the pledge, 
either in order that one may be kept by the subscriber as a 
memorandum, or in order that one may be deposited with the 
bank or factory through which collections are to be made; the 
other copy in every case goes to the war chest office. 

Detroit, instead of having a separate pledge card for each 
employee within a factory, had simply a sheet with an appro- 

85 



priate pledge form at the top, authorizing the employer to 
deduct the face of the pledge. Below there was space for 
names and addresses. This plan made it possible for employ- 
ees to see what their fellows had done and readily centered 
attention upon any who refused to subscribe or subscribed in 
meagre amounts. In a city, however, which does not intend 
to use the Detroit underwriting plan, there are serious disad- 
vantages in this method, and its only value in such cases comes 
from its usefulness for purposes of exerting moral pressure in 
the direction of subscribing and subscribing adequately. 

Some pledge forms are so unique that they call for separate 
mention. Deer Lodge County war chest fund, with headquar- 
ters at Anaconda, Montana, had a card providing space at top 
for name, address, telephone number, factory number, occupa- 
tion, place of business, whether married or single, and number - 
of dependents. Beneath was a pledge form with four options — 
the amount to be deducted by employer, agreement to pay at the 
war chest headquarters, authorization to a bank to make pay- 
ment, agreement to pay through a union. The space for signa- 
ture was below and then blanks for recording Liberty bond pur- 
chases up to the twentieth issue, also for war saving stamps, 
and a space for remarks. At the bottom of the card there was 
recorded the division, district supervisor, the captain, and the 
lieutenant who took the pledge. The back of the card was a 
ledger form. 

Boyd County, with headquarters at Ashland, Ky., had a 
pledge in the shape of a booklet, the front cover of which carried 
a pledge form with date, residence and business 'phones, resi- 
dence and business addresses, v/itness, and number. The back 
page had authorization to the employer to substitute a coupon 
each month for that part of his pay which the individual had 
subscribed, and an authorization to a bank to honor one of the 
coupons each month. The inside of the booklet was a sheet 
of coupons on which the amount of the payment and the number 
could be stamped. This could be left with the employer to put 
in pay envelopes as a substitute for part of the subscriber's 
vs^ages, or could be left with the bank to enclose with his state- 
ment, or could be taken by the subscriber who paid direct to 
the war chest office. 

Nutley, N. J., conducted a mail solicitation and the pledge 
form was on a postcard which carried the subscriber's name, 
address and a list of amounts, around one of which the sub- 
scriber might draw a circle to indicate the amount of his sub- 
scription. 

A great many had separate forms for individual subscrib- 
ers, employees, bank pledge cards, union cards, percentage 
cards, etc., some cities having as many as six or seven forms, 
becoming very complex indeed. Generally speaking, both from 

86 



the point of view of handling supplies and from the points of 
view of economy and public understanding, it is better to have 
as few forms as possible. 

A few cities had a special form known as the employer's 
equal giving card. That used by Attleboro read: "Beginning 
June 1, 1918 we hereby agree to deposit weekly with the Attle- 
boro war chest all money deducted by us from our employees 
wages on account of war chest pledges, together with an equal 
amount as this company's contribution to the fund. We will 
endeavor to secure a pledge from each person in our employ 
now and those we may employ for the duration of this agree- 
ment, furnishing the war chest office with a list of the names 
and total amount paid weekly." As pointed out elsewhere, 
this pledge has the weakness of making the employer's pay- 
ments vary, a practice which does not facilitate clear or simple 
bookkeeping. One or two cities, notably Burlington, Iowa, in- 
corporated in their pledge form, which was presented to em- 
ployees, a statement that the subscription was conditional on 
the subscription by the employer of an amount equal to the 
total subscripion of all his employees. 

Springfield, Mass., had the employer retain the pledge 
cards of his employees and send to the war chest a letter of 
advice giving a list of the contributors and amounts. This 
letter of advice was made in duplicate and contained an agree- 
ment "to use our best efforts to collect these pledges and remit 
monthly to the treasurer" with the understanding, however, 
that "liability is limited to the safe transmission of the funds 
collected by us and that no responsibility for the payment of 
the pledges is assumed by us." The actual pledge card was sent 
to the war chest office only when the employee left his service. 

Three or four cities, notably Mitchell, South Dakota, and 
Racine, Wisconsin, incorporated in the pledge form an affirma- 
tion either that the pledge was not less than the individual's 
fair share or that the subscription amounted at least to a cer- 
tain percentage of income. 

There are just two or three things that experience has 
indicated ought to be carefully avoided in making up pledge 
cards and which, though in themselves trivial, may cause a good 
deal of trouble. In the first place, do not use blue pledge cards 
because of the difficulty of reading them. One city which used 
that color reported many dollars lost as a result of wasted time. 
In the second place many pledge cards fail to make absolutely 
clear whether the amount which the subscriber enters is the 
amount of a monthly payment or the total amount of the pledge ; 
for example, one pledge card read as follows — "I agree to pay 

monthly for one year to the treasurer the sum of dollars. 

I agree to make my payments monthly, quarterly, semi-annually." 
Many subscribers put the monthly amount in the blank, many 
others put the yearly amount in the blank, the result being that 

87 



it was impossible to tell what any individual subscriber actually 
intended. In every case the pledge card should state distinctly 
the total amount of the pledge and the method of payment. It 
is not necessary that it should state the amount to be paid at 
each installment. Some cities have urged that more will be 
subscribed if the total does not appear. If that augument ap- 
pears sound, communities ought to provide a separate card for 
each manner of payment — whether monthly, quarterly or semi- 
annual — otherwise many will agree to pay five dollars but 
despite everything will neglect to state whether it is five dollars 
annually, quarterly or monthly. In the third place it is very 
wise indeed to have the solicitor re-write the name of the sub- 
scriber, though he may not write any better than the sub- 
scriber the chances of reading a name which is almost illegible 
.are better if you have two copies from which to guess. 

A suggested pledge form follows : 



Name Clock No _ 

Employer Installment $.. 

Total Payable $ ....__... ...._.. 'Phone 

Address .._ „_ _..— _. Method 



(Do not write above this line,) 

As evidence of my interest in the work of the war auxiliary agencies, 
and in consideration of the gifts of others, I agree to pay the total sum of 

dollars to the Treasurer, within the period of one year in 

equal installments, payable 



annually ( 


) 




semi-annually ( 


) 


(Mark X the manner of payment 


quarterly ( 


) 


you prefer.) 


monthly ( 


) 





I hereby authorize the Executive Committee to expend my subscription 
in accordance with the by-laws of the Wiar Chest Association, 

Signature _...^ 

Residence 'Phone _ Home address _ 

Obtained by Firm name of Employer 

Team No _ _ Employer's business address..l._ 

Clock No _ „ 



(Solicitor must print subscriber's name on above line.) 



COUPON 1. 

I hereby authorize and request my employer to deduct equal install- 
ments of the above pledge four times each month until the full amount has 
been paid. 

Name _ 

(To be retained by employer.) Address 

Clock No „ 

(Reverse side to carry ruled* ledger form with 48 spaces.) 



COUPON 2. 

I hereby authorize the Bank to honor official receipts 

for a total of..- , payable each month in equal installmenits. 

Name 

(To be retained by bank.) Address _ - 

'Phone -. 

(Reverse side to carry ruled spaces for bank to check 12 payments. 



COUPON 3 (County form) 

I agree to pay the above pledges promptly on the first of each month 

at 

Name _ _ 

Address _ 

'Phone _ 



Designated Gifts. 

One of the most frequently used arguments against the 
war chest has been that persons have interests in individual or- 
ganizations and that in consequence they will not heartily sup- 
port a war chest. The executive manager of the Massachusetts 
Committee of Public Safety argued as follows : 

"Tom Jones may well wish to invest every dollar he can afford for 
the benefit of the Y. M. C. A., while Charles Smith is equally anxious 
that every bit of his savings go to forward the work of the Red Cross, 
Knights of Columbus, the Young Men's Hebrew Association, or kin- 
dred organizations. It is human nature for a man or woman to wish 
to have something to say about where his money goes and just what 
it is to be used for when he contributes it. * * * Therefore, if my 
supposition is correct, people would contribute very much less through 
the war chest than they would directly." 

Mr. L. Wilbur Messer of the Chicago Y. M. C. A., stated that 
under the war chest plan a man could not order his money 

89 



"used for a special cause in which he is particularly interested. 
He will merely contribute to a nebulous blanket of so-called 
'good causes'." 

The argument is really that the war chest has neglected 
to understand the sentimental side of the matter of giving, that 
the war chest movement overlooks the fact that the various 
agencies have each their own constituencies, that there are some 
people whose main interest is in the Red Cross, others who as 
Catholics prefer to give their all to the Knights of Columbus, 
etc. 

So far as can be ascertained this argument has never pre- 
tended to rest upon concrete experience but has always been 
based upon a chain of reasoning from analogy, from psychology, 
at all events never on anything save a theoretical foundation. 
In the course of the investigation which is the basis of this 
report a bona fide endeavor was made to gather the experience 
of cities in this matter. 

The results of that effort have been to demonstrate in the 
first place that the indictment was drawn with too sweeping 
a hand. It is by no means true that all cities prohibited the 
designation of gifts. Many cities recognized this factor and 
made provision for it. Detroit was particularly explicit. Its 
publicity contained the following statement: "Subscribers may 
designate the war or local organization to be benefited by their 
contributions and the proportion each is to receive." And in 
its "question and answer" publicity there appeared the follow- 
ing: "Can the giver designate the organizations to which he 
wishes to give? Yes." Cairo, Illinois, instructed those who 
had objections to contributing money to any one or more organ- 
izations included in the list to make their wishes known to the 
board of control. Lexington, Mass., instructed its solicitors to 
the effect that, while monthly pledges were preferred without 
restrictions, if a member of the war chest association desired 
to give to a special object he might write it on the pledge. 
Northampton, Mass., in its publicity instructions said subscrib- 
ers "can designate one or more objects where their contribu- 
tions are to be used." Other cities while not so explicit in 
advertising the matter, leaving the initiative in the matter of 
designating a gift with the interested individual, did permit it 
without objection. Still others, though they advised against it, 
permitted it. For example, Nutley, N. J,, had a line on the 
pledge card marked "special", to be used by the subscriber "for 
limitations to be put on the use of the subscriber's money— such 
as 'for Red Cross only', 'for Y. M. C. A. or K. of C. only,' or 
such limitations as 'not to be used for Y. W. C. A.,' 'not to be 
used for Red Cross or Boy Scouts, etc' Do not accept such 
limitations on subscriptions if you can avoid it. This provision 
is only made to be used in the event that a subscriber will not 

90 



make a regular unlimited subscription." These serve as fairly 
typical examples of the different practices which have been 
adopted in cities which permitted the designation of gifts. 

Rather than make any general statement about this mat- 
ter it is deemed best to repeat at his point exactly what each 
city reported on the subject in response to the question whether 
designated gifts were permitted, and, if so, what was their 
number and their value. Ambridge, Pa., replied "not many"; 
Ashland, Ky., "very few — too small to notice" ; Attleboro, Mass., 
"7900 pledges — three (one a national bank) designated, amount- 
ing to $1800 cut of a total of $140,000." ; Billings, Mont., $5,000 
designated by ten or twelve subscribers out of a war chest 
amounting to $150,000; Burling-ton, Iowa, $100 designated; 
Butte, Mont., "less than five per cent." ; Cairo, 111., "none" ; 
Dayton, 0., "number small, amount insignificant" ; Detroit 
"certainly not over $100,000 in a war chest of $10,500,000."; 
Granville, N. Y., "three gifts, $125.00 monthly"; Janesville, 
Wis., "small per cent." ; Lexington, Mass.. "about ten, value less 
than $500 out of a total of $63,000"; Lockport, N. Y., "very 
few" ; Meriden "It will not amount to over 5;% of the total sub- 
scriptions taken," part of this being national bank subscrip- 
tions. Northampton, Mass., "not two per cent, of subscribers 
designated the object"; Philadelphia, perhaps half a million out 
about twenty millions, due to certain corporations and banks — 
small in number not over one hundred cards being designated 
out of about 600,000 subscribers ; Pittsfield, Mass., "not many — 
will not reach 5%."; Osage City, Kan., $100 out of a total of 
$21,00. Roanoke, Va., sent the following schedule: 



Cause 


Amount 


For Red Cross, 


$ 8,098.02 


For Y. M. C. A., 


1,487.34 


For Y. W. C. A., 


426...96 


For Associated Charities, 


496.47 


For Salvation Army, 


547.80 


For City Hospital, 


5,057.64 


For Colored Hospital, 


122.00 


For Free Medical Dispensary, 


56.00 


For Play Grounds, 


1.00 


For Travelers' Aid, 


15.64 


For War Camp Fund, 


15.50 


For Visiting Nurses' Association, 


6.00 


For Knights of Columbus (37 pledges), 


390.83 


Against Knights of Columbus (28 pledges), 


604.00 


For Causes unable to apportion amounts. 


1,750.00 


Unconditional pledges, 


212,225.87 




$231,301.07 



91 



Salem, Mass., answered "none"; Savannah, Ga., "very few, 
value $5,000 out of a total of $310,000; Sheboygan "some for 
Red Cross only" ; Tonawanda, "value $24.00 a year out of total 
of $202,500." ; Toledo, "extremely small, both as to number and 
amount" ; York, Pa., about 12 out of 15,000 subscribers, with a 
total value of about $1,500 out of $400,000. 

Cities which largely ignored the matter were Rome, N, Y., 
in which no gifts were designated, Springfield, Mass., in which 
perhaps $10,000 was designated, and Utica, N. Y., in which both 
number and amount were small. A number of other cities 
which do not report whether or not designated gifts were for- 
bidden, state that none were received. Among these are Che- 
mung, N. Y., Coschocton, Ohio, Elkhart, Ind., Ely, Minn., Keno- 
sha, Wis., Lansing, Mich., Newberry, Mich., Oswego, N. Y., and 
Sycamore, 111. 

One or two cities reported that they prohibited such gifts 
and that some slight friction resulted. Vevay, Indiana, writes: 
"We had three persons in the county that wanted their contri- 
butions applied to the Red Cross only. We accepted .their 
money on that condition, value $36.00." Lambertville, N. J., 
reported that several large sums were contributed direct to the 
Red Cross. Salem, Mass., reported that several people said 
they would give to the individual agencies, and an effort is now 
being made to discover whether they did as they said they would 
or simply used this as an excuse. 

It must be remembered in the cases of all the cities that 
national banks are required to designate their gifts for the 
Red Cross and the statistics above include many such cases 
beside those which are specifically noted in the text. 

Recognizing the incomplete and rough character of this 
sort of a tabulation it remains, nevertheless, the best it has been 
possible to make and appears to contain whatever there is of 
data available which is based on actual experience. Impartial 
scrutiny can lead to no other conclusion than that the theoreti- 
cal arguments on the subject appear to lack confirmation in ex- 
perience. On the contrary instead of indications that the mass 
of people are interested in specific organizations we find it to 
be more true that they are interested in the work rather than 
in the organizations to which the work chances to be committed, 
that they are concerned about the results rather than the agen- 
cies which are to bring them about, that the welfare of the 
soldier, physical, mental, and moral, is more in their minds than 
the problem of which precise instrument shall carry forward 
the ministry to that welfare. As one individual put it, "It is 
undeniable that the Red Cross and Young Men's Christian As- 
sociation had no such clienteles before the war as now are con- 
tributing to the support of war work. The present body of 
givers cannot be regarded as the clientele of any organization. 

92 



They are the clientele of the American soldier. These agencies 
are deriving their immensely increased support from the public, 
not because of their individual merits but because they are of- 
ficially endorsed by the Government as the instruments which 
it has selected to assist in the maintenance of the morale of the 
American army." While one may quarrel with that statement 
of the case the root idea beneath it seems, in the light of exper- 
ience, to be essentially sound. These agencies are appealing 
to a new public. The smaller ones never reached more than an 
imperceptible portion of the public before. The Knights of 
Columbus never engaged in public solicitation before. The Red 
Triangle appeals now to a vastly wider and largely different 
public and for new and broader purposes than ever before. 
Even the Red Cross never before approached the great mass 
of people who have now become contributors. No one of these 
agencies therefore, despite its breadth and size before the war, 
places its main reliance upon its old clientele. 

The experience in war chest cities would seem to indicate 
that men and women find themselves puzzled by the multiplicity 
of calls and recognize the fact that among agencies equally en- 
dorsed by the highest officials of the nation they are not in- 
dividually competent to discriminate as to relative values and 
consequent need for support. 

The arguments in question have a tendency to imply that 
these agencies are competing. Certainly that would be most 
unfortunate. It is true that all these agencies with direct gov- 
ernmental endorsement are engaged in a work which has in 
final analysis an identical aim, namely, the maintenance and 
development of morale and the consequent upbuilding of the 
efficiency of the fighting forces. But the Red Cross does not do 
the work assigned to the Fosdick Commission. Within that 
commission the tasks assigned to the Library Association and 
those assigned to the War Camp Community Service and to the 
Young Women's Christian Association are quite distinct. It is 
true that the Young Men's Christian Association, the Knights 
of Columbus, the Jewish Welfare League, and the Salvation 
Army are engaged in much the same work but they ought not 
to be presented to the public as competitors. All have govern- 
mental endorsement. The Salvation Army, though not under 
the Fosdick Cohimission, had a letter from the President of the 
United States expressing his admiration for the work it had 
done and his sincere "hope that it may be fully sustained." 
Moreover much emphasis is put upon the cordial relations and 
cooperation among these agencies. The Jewish work is being 
carried forward in France as a branch of the Young Men's 
Christian Association. The huts of the Knights of Columbus 
and Young Men's Christian Association are open to the workers 
of both. When their drives for money have been going for- 

93 



ward they have exchanged speakers in many communities and it 
is demonstrable that Protestants have contributed liberally to 
the Knights of Columbus and Catholics to the Red Triangle. 
In short, the common aim of all these organizations, the common 
endorsement of all these organizations, and the broad catholicity 
of spirit engendered by the war have all operated to break down 
ancient prejudices so far that experiences, even outside ol: war 
chest cities, has demonstrated that the argiunent in question is 
unsound. 

In view of all these things it is not surprising that prejudice 
did not prove so strong as arguments from theory made it ap- 
pear or that the people were unwilling to turn over the matter 
of apportioning their gifts to an impartial and broadly repre- 
sentative body. 

Of course it must be recognized that prejudice has occa- 
sionally made itself felt. In the fall of 1917 the disbursement 
committee of the Syracuse War Chest made an appropriation 
for the Knights of Columbus. Certain elements protested vig- 
orously. A candid statement was made through the press by 
Mr. D. E. Petit, the treasurer of the fund, and the agitation 
subsided. As some gauge of the extent of the dissatisfaction 
it may be pointed out that in its second campaign the amount 
subscribed was more than double that of the first year. This 
indicates that the whole question had ceased to agitate the pub- 
lic mind. In another city different methods produced different 
results. A policy of silence and refusal to explain allowed the 
agitation to develop until it reached large proportions. Much 
must depend upon the personnel of those in charge and upon 
the tact and wisdom of their presentation of the question. 

The conclusion which has been reached from the study of 
the material on this topic is that the question is not so serious 
as has often been supposed. Nevertheless it seems wise not to 
prohibit the designation of gifts, while not on the other hand 
encouraging them. The reasons for this conclusion are that it 
destroys the excuse of the person who would like to use the 
argument about designating where his money shall go in order 
to avoid giving anything; in the second place, however few 
there may be who have a distinct preference or prejudice, it is 
their money which is being given, and while it is proper to 
point out to them that the practice is not wholly desirable their 
wishes ought to be respected; and in the third place, since the 
amount is almost invariably small, it does not unduly compli- 
cate the bookkeeping. It is perhaps not generally recognized 
that much the same practice prevails in the matter of giving to 
the Red Cross, that a person may, in making his subscription 
to the Red Cross, designate the manner in which it is to be used, 
but the results indicate that the experience of the Red Cross is 
much the sam.e as in the case of the war chests. 

94 



Competition. 

It is usually believed and is unquestionably true that com- 
petition of one sort or other is one of the most certain methods 
of securing a large community gift. Some few cities reported 
that they made no effort to have a contest of any kind on the 
ground that there was no need to stimulate giving through 
competition because the citizens of the community had been so 
thoroughly roused to the needs created by the war. Among 
these are some successful war chests but the most successful 
ones are almost invariably those which have paid the most at- 
tention to the matter of stimulating competition. 

Competition may be of several sorts. The first kind is a 
team competition. This is by no means universal but has been 
made the keynote in certain instances, notably in Springfield, 
Mass., where a great effort was made to render the competition 
between the teams fair by careful rating, by impartial assign- 
ment of prospect cards, and by the development of separate 
groups — the Navy for the large givers, the Home Guard for the 
persons in the home, the Army for the industrial givers, etc. — 
each team competing only with the teams in its own group. 
Thus at the cost of great pains the competitive feature was 
given freest rein and the results were extraordinary in pro- 
ducing close competition. 

Many cities added to the team competition a factory com- 
petition. Under this plan an effort was made to induce the 
several departments to engage in rivalry to see which could 
get the highest percentage of its members enrolled and a special 
card was given to each department which secured 100% enroll- 
ment, and sometimes a card for 75% enrollment or better. Like- 
v/ise between factories the percentage of enrollment competi- 
tion was stimulated. This has worked out as one of the very 
best methods of securing pledges, and the results in cities like 
Rochester, Utica and Columbus were nothing short of extraor- 
dinary, as many as 97% of all the workers in some cities having 
pledged to contribute to the war chest. The result has been in 
many cases that of all the groups who participated in war chest 
giving the industrial employees have done more in proportion to 
their means than any other. 

Several cities extended this type of competition to stores, 
to newspaper offices, to public utilities, and in fact to any es- 
tablishment where a group of people Vv'^as employed. As far as 
possible various concerns which have a natural rivalry already 
were thrown into competition by means of public bulletin boards 
and subscriptions stimulated in that fashion. 

Most of these schemes for devolping rivalry use a percen- 
tage basis, rather than the amount pledged, as the keynote of 
competition. In Albany, for example, this type of competition 
was carried into the homes division, each major tried to see to 

95 



it that his ward had a larger percentage of population enrolled 
than any other. The emphasis was not put upon amounts, be- 
cause of the differences in wealth in various parts of the city, 
which would make that an unfair basis for competitive effort. 
Toledo, Ohio, attempted to reach something like the same result 
by means of assigning each ward a quota. The competition 
consisted in an effort to be the first to reach the assigned quota 
and after that to oversubscribe the most liberally. This did not 
work out as well as was expected. 

Rochester succeeded in combining factory competition on 
a percentage basis with team competition on the basis of 
amounts raised, because of the care that was exercised in assign- 
ing plants to teams in such fashion that each team had an equal 
number of prospects, of a value equal to those of every other 
team. This has the advantage that it stimulates not only uni- 
versal giving but universal giving on a sacrificial scale. When- 
ever competition can reasonably be put on a basis of amounts, 
it produces larger giving as well as practically universal giving. 

War chests which cover a number of towns have found it 
advisable to have a competition among communities embraced. 
The war chest of Lewis County, New York, for example, gave a 
banner to the town which first oversubscribed its quota. Phil- 
adelphia had a flag competition between the various divisions 
and counties. Each was given a quota and whenever that quota 
was reached, a flag was awarded and for every 25% over-sub- 
scription, a shield was attached to the flag. This was on the 
same principle, of course, as honor flags in third Liberty loan. 

In view of the experience of cities, it seems that an effort 
should be made to have competition between teams in the homes 
division on the basis of percentage of population enrolled. This 
involves careful differentiation of the population of the homes 
division from the total population in the area because of the 
fact that many are reached in the industrial campaign. This 
should be done only if it cannot be done without a great deal 
of difficulty. Without a complete system of prospect cards or 
at least a census, it is virtually impossible. Not enough money 
is received from this division to m.ake it worth while going into 
difficult and expensive competition in order to stimulate a con- 
test in amounts. Usually there is no way in which, under the 
system outlined above, a fair quota can be fixed for the different 
w^ards covered by the homes division inasmuch as so many peo- 
ple will be reached away from home that it w^ould be necessary 
to rate the stay-at-homes in order to reach such a quota. 

As to other divisions, it is worth while to spend a great deal 
of effort to stimulate rivalries through a percentage competition 
and so gain a maximum number of subscribers; and also to 
assign prospects on the Rochester, or Springfield, or some ana- 
logous plan so that there will be a competition in amounts, as 
well, for this stimulates large giving. 

96 



Use of Pressure. 

A discussion of the use of pressure belongs rather in a 
treatise on campaign ethics than a report on war chest prac- 
tice. It becomes necessary to deal with the subject because the 
war chest makes the use of pressure easier and more justifiable. 
The use of pressure becomes easier because of the possibility, 
through concentration of effort, of building an intensive cam- 
paign so that every individual can be reached, and can be reach- 
ed in the company of his fellows, who if it seems desirable can 
exert pressure. There is no question that in many cases pres- 
sure has been used. In one city in some factories where only 
one or two individuals refused to give, their associates demand- 
ed their discharge and struck to enforce their demand. In an- 
other instance a man was compelled by social pressure to leave 
his employment. The matter went so far in one city that a few 
of those who refused to subscribe were given a coat of yellow 
paint, and rumor has it that elsewhere tar and feathers were 
resorted to. 

These instances are not typical — they are extreme — but 
they illustrate the fact that under the war chest plan pressure 
can be used if it meets the judgment of the committee and the 
desires of the subscribers. 

To condemn the war chest on the basis of such extreme 
manifestations would be absurd because it would overlook en- 
tirely the fact that other cities operating under the war chest 
principle show equally extreme instances of refusal to use pres- 
sure. An illustration in point is the warning given solicitors 
in Terre Haute, quoted elsewhere, that they must not be found 
even making a suggestion as to what any individual should do. 
Coshocton, Ohio, specifically warned the solicitors that "no in- 
timidation or coercion should be attempted" and stated "It is 
desired to reiterate what has frequently been explained that 
there are cases where people should be excused entirely from 
giving because of financial distress or other extraordinary rea- 
sons." The point under discussion is simply that the highly 
organized character which the war chest may assume makes 
it possible to use pressure if that is the desire of the community. 

At the same time the war chest plan makes the use of 
pressure more justifiable or more nearly justifiable, whichever 
statement one may prefer. The question whether pressure is 
ever justifiable in an effort to rouse people to giving is one of 
opinion. Each moralist will settle the matter positively for 
himself but for no one else. This report makes no effort to 
express a judg-ment on that topic. It is concerned merely to 
this extent that if pressure is ever justifiable it is proper in the 
case of a war chest. If a man refuses to give to one agency 
conducting a drive, on the ground that he prefers to give to 
another organization, it is very difficult under those circum- 

97 



stances to justify the use of pressure to compel him to give. 
On the other hand, when under the v/ar chest plan all patriotic 
solicitations are merged, there is not the same reason why pres- 
sure should not be used to induce a niggard to loosen his purse 
strings, particularly if his prejudice is so far catered to as to 
allow him to designate the use to which his gift may be put. 
After all, these agencies come to the public with government 
endorsement as vital to the effective conduct of the war. In a 
sense, therefore, contribution to their support is a part of pa- 
triotic duty. Contribution to any specific one of them is not a 
part of patriotic duty but contribution to some of them certainly 
is. The war chest calls upon a man to give to some few or 
some one of them. It is a call, therefore, to performance of 
patriotic duty. Surely, if pressure is ever justifiable in the 
matter of giving it is under these circumstances. 

It is extremely difficult to draw clear lines between rivalry, 
stimulus, and pressure. Because of its efficient organization 
and its broad character, rivalry is intensified under the war 
chest, enthusiasm with its consequent stimailus is greater than 
ever before, and pressure of that character as w^ell as of a moral 
sort is, broadly speaking, greater than under the drive system. 

The channels through which pressure, apart from that 
spontaneously engendered by rivalry, manifests itself are chiefly 
through the work of the revision committee and the publication 
of names. 

In one city those who had clearly failed to measure up to 
their responsibilities were asked to visit the executive committee 
in order that there might be a frank discussion of the matter. 
This serves as a fairly typical example of the work done in 
perhaps a dozen cities by bodies variously known as "headquar- 
ters committee", "executive committee", or "the wrecking 
crew." The methods of these committees vary from the most 
thoroughly patient and helpful discussion with a view to open- 
ing the eyes of the subscriber to his duty, to something perilous- 
ly close to strong arm methods. It is absolutely impossible to 
dogmatize about this practice because the differences in degree 
are so great that they amount to differences in kind. 

The second channel of pressure is through the publication 
of names. This practice is not original with or peculiar to the 
war chest. A great many war chest officials violently disap- 
prove of the practice. It is probably fair to say the majority 
disapproves. On the other hand, some committees in charge 
of drives use this method. For example, the names of all the 
subscribers to the second Red Cross War Fund in New Haven 
are published together with the amounts. 

The basis for this, whether used in a drive for a separate 
agency or for the war chest, is that the publication of names 
brings pressure only upon those whom it will ultimately benefit 
by initiating them into the practice of giving. Committees 



often feel furthermore that in time of war people ought to be 
willing to 'stand up and be counted' and frequently a war chest 
is run with that as its slogan. 

In one city the problem was stated this way: 

"The question is whether you have reached the point where there 
are no slackers. In some cities — 'for example, Toronto, Canada, — 
there would be no practical value in publishing names because the 
community has become so thoroughly absorbed in the war that anyone 
not wholly in sympathy has long since been brought into the open. 
In most American cities, however, there are still a number who need 
to have the nature anid extent of their obligations brought home to 
them with somewhat more vigor than they have yet had." 

It must be said too that part of the objection to this prac- 
tice rests upon the fact that large givers who in times before 
the war allowed their names to be published inevitably found 
themselves put on the "sucker lists" of various charitable ap- 
peals, and thus there developed a prejudice against the publica- 
tion of either names or amounts. The objection on this score 
does not apply with anything like equal force in time of war 
because there are other considerations which are very much 
more important. 

One other thing ought to be said. So far as cities have 
reported, none which adopted the practice of publishing names 
would do otherwise in another campaign. On the other hand, 
several cities which did not follow this idea, though they met 
with success, said nevertheless that were they to campaign again, 
names would be published. 

Those who had charge of the war chest in Rochester, N. Y., 
feel that this was one of the strongest features of their cam- 
paign and that while there was a good deal of complaint at 
the outset it speedily disappeared. Hudson Falls, N. Y., found 
also that it became the source of some objection, particularly 
because some few were too modest to have their names publish- 
ed. Those, however, who objected most vigorously were those 
who did not wish to do their share and the committee felt that 
the publication of names and amounts was one of the most val- 
uable features of their effort. Salem, Mass., published the 
names and amounts and found the chief complaint came from 
those who did not give what they ought. They found, on the 
other hand, that certain of their larger contributors complained 
at the outset, but on having it pointed out to them that by allow- 
ing it they were helping to smoke out shirkers their opposition 
was withdrawn. Lynn, Mass., decided upon this plan at the 
last moment after many pledges had been taken. Some people 
telephoned in and withdrew their pledges. The war fund asso- 
ciation returned those subscriptions without comment. The 
committee in charge feel, however, that fully ten times as much 

99 



ay was lost came in because the names of the givers were pub- 
lished together with the amounts which they subscribed. Glens 
Falls, N. Y., published each day a list of all the givers and the 
amounts. It is believed there that they did not lose a single 
subscriber, rather that they gained greatly both in numbers 
and amounts. The directors, therefore, are substantially unan- 
imous in the statement that it was a wise policy though at first 
some of them opposed it with vigor, Albany decided to publish 
the names and amounts after the campaign was launched. 
There were some who objected but none withdrew iheir sub- 
scriptions. On the contrary, after it became known that names 
and amounts would be published a large number of people be- 
sieged the war chest office in person and by telephone to in- 
crease their subscriptions. 

Frequently it is argued that this practice bears with un- 
equal weight upon those who cannot give largely and who feel 
some stigma attaching to them when their names are published 
with meagre amounts after them. In practice — if reports from 
the various cities are to be trusted — there was no objection on 
the part of the small givers. In practically ever instance con- 
tributors of this class took to the plan because they realized that 
vv^hile they gave less it was often more in proportion than some 
of the larger contributions and they knew that their associates 
would recognize that fact. 

A number of cities did not publish all names and amounts 
but only those of the larger subscribers. This was not done in 
order to make an invidious distinction or even because of fear 
lest the small givers be mortified, but because of the physical 
problem involved. It was found to be practically impossible to 
get space enough to publish all names and amounts. Further- 
more, they believed that the smaller givers did not need this 
sort of stimulus inasmuch as they were subjected to sufficient 
pressure through the desire of their fellows to have 100% fac- 
tories or stores. Cities which followed this practice were, for 
example, Cleveland, which published the names and amounts of 
all who gave over $100.00 ; Detroit, which published the names 
and amounts of all who gave $500.00 or more ; and Toledo which 
published the names of those who gave largely. 

Still other cities have adopted the plan of publishing the 
names and amounts, not during the drive, but after it is over. 
For the most part this is done simply because of the physical 
problem involved, since pledges pour in at such a rate that it is 
impossible to list them accurately for publication and because 
of the fact that they take too much expensive space in the news- 
papers. The only argument beyond that arising from the 
physical problem is that publication of names after the cam- 
paign includes only those who have fulfilled their pledges in 
some measure at least and so gives credit only to those who have 
demonstrated their good faith. 

100 



A number of cities published simply the names but not the 
amounts, on the ground that publication of amounts gave ad- 
vertising to the large people and made invidious distinctions 
between them and smaller givers, and also on the ground that 
the publication of amounts encouraged a tendency to gossip as 
to the size of the contribution of a given individual who was 
popularly supposed to have more money than he actually had 
and might result in some unnecessary humiliation. Cities which 
published the amounts feel that, these arguments do not apply 
so seriously as some presume, but this at least was the basis on 
which many committees reasoned. 

A modification of this plan is found in the use of the honor 
roll, which was employed, for example, in the Red Cross drive 
in Hartford. Under this. plan the names of those who contrib- 
ute in any given factory or store or office are posted conspic- 
uously, sometimes with and sometimes without the amounts. 
This is practically the same as the publication of names, be- 
cause it advertises a person to his own public, and whereas in 
a long list his name might be overlooked by his friends, this 
plan brings the absentee into conspicuous prominence among 
those with whom he has day-to-day contact. Occasionally this 
is used in addition to newspaper publicity; more frequently, as 
a substitute. 

Still another practice which has developed is the publishing 
of names of those who refuse to give in a "slackers' list." This 
has been threatened in a number of cases but has been done in 
relatively few. Part of the explanation comes from the fact 
that cities have usually been happily surprised at the small 
number who refused to subscribe and have feJt in consequence 
that it was not worth while to publish their names. As one 
prominent war chest advocate put it in a city where this was 
threatened, "Why destroy the joy of thousands by publishing 
the names of a couple of slackers? It is far better to keep that 
vv"ord from being heard at all either during or after the cam- 
paign and to lay the emphasis upon the number of our patriots 
and to stimulate people in that way, than to lay the emphasis 
upon those who are slackers and depend upon clubbing them." 

Escanaba, Mich., published not only the names of those 
who refused to contribute but also the names of those who 
sought to pay less than they should. It is perfectly obvious 
that the publication of the names of those who refuse to give 
is a more delicate problem than the publishing of the names 
and amounts of those who do give and to publish the names of 
those who do not give all they should is a task more delicate 
still. Certainly if either of these two latter plans is followed — 
and neither is advised — the list should be very carefully checked 
over and the individuals in question should be given repeated 
opportunity to subscribe, because so much depends upon the 

101 



personality and approach of the solicitor that injustice may 
very easily result. 

One or two cities are planning to publish books. Lynn, 
Mass., projected a plan — whether carried to consummation or 
not has not been ascertained — by which a book was to be built 
up on the basis of the city's patriotic census. Every person in 
the city was to be listed together with what he gave to the war 
chest, and a statement wheher he had bought Tiiberty Bonds and 
War Savings Stamps, whether he was a member of the Red 
Cross, and what patriotic work he was doing. Copies are to be 
sent to all the soldiers and sailors from that city in order that 
they may see just which people back hom.e are supporting their 
efforts and to what extent. 

There is just one other practice in this matter of the pub- 
lication of names which requires a word of comment, namely, 
the proposal of certain cities to publish the names of delinquents. 
This, if it is done at all, must be done with the most extreme 
care. Some people will unquestionably be delinquent justifi- 
ably because of sickness, accident, unemployment, or other 
causes, and a very careful process of checking up and a very 
discriminatory judgment will be requisite before delinquents' 
names are sent to the press. 

In conclusion it seems inescapable that, inasmuch as every 
city which has reported that it followed the practice of publish- 
ing names and amounts endorses it as wise, and since criticisms 
come only from cities which have not tested the plan, the idea 
is not without merit if one is a convert to the use of pressure 
in any form. If, however, the plan is adopted it should be 
clearly stated well in advance of the campaign, the reasons 
should be candidly set forth, no exceptions made in practice, 
and promises rigidly fulfilled. 

The publication of names without the amounts has by no 
means the same value. It stimulates only in the direction of 
producing a number of givers, not in the direction of produc- 
ing adequate gifts. The use of the honor roll is an effective 
substitute for, as well as a valuable adjunct to, newspaper pub- 
licity. 

Publication of names after the campaign is over is less use- 
ful than publication contemporaneously, but has the counter- 
vailing advantage of being a test of the sincerity of pledges if 
published after a few payments have been made. In many 
cases, especially in large cities, this plan will have to be follow- 
ed if the names are to be published at all. 

The publication of the names of those who refuse to con- 
tribute is less likely to be fair and wise and the publication of 
those who contribute less than they ought requires so much 
judgment and such intimate knowledge of the personal con- 
cerns of so many people, that it seems to be distincly unwise. 

102 



Follow-up Subscriptions. 

Industrial — The war chests in several cities, but by no 
means in all, have a well-developed system of handling the prob- 
lem of getting new subscribers in> conjunction with their schemes 
for taking care of labor turn-over. It is not necessary to go into 
this in any detail. Distinctly the best plan is to have a perma- 
nent organization within each factory and store and a worth- 
while 100% sign for each establishment as well as for each 
department within it. When a new employee enters he is so- 
licited, and if he fails to subscribe his department and his fac- 
tory lose their 100% signs, which has a tendency to center at- 
tention upon the individual who is unwilling to help. This sys- 
tem has a tendency also to help take care of the labor turn-over 
problem, because it is more certain to get a report of incoming 
employees to the w^ar chest. It has the value, moreover, that it 
keeps the idea of the war chest alive and continuously refreshes 
the sense of responsibility among the men. In som.e cities this 
work is done through the offices where men seek employment. 
A better plan, and one which has been adopted in one Connec- 
ticut city, is to have that office simply ask as oue of its questions 
whether the man is a subscriber to the war chest and if not, 
give him explanatory literature, but to leave the actual solicita- 
tion to some fellow-employee in the department in which he is 
to work. 

Personal — There are three kinds of follow-up work in the 
field of personal subscriptions : first, reaching those who enter 
a community after one war chest campaign and before the next 
one, in order that they may not be immune from giving for a 
long period of time; second, reaching those who refuse to give 
in the first campaign ; and, third, increasing the subscriptions of 
those w^ho gave but not in the proportion they should from a 
social standpoint. 

The first problem, that of reaching the people who enter 
the community, is of some importance both in order that deaths 
and removals may be offset, so that the war chest shall not fall 
below its anticipated fund, and in order that the absence of 
drives may not permit newcomers to fail to integrate them- 
selves with the community of war givers. The methods which 
have been adopted for this are various. One plan is to have 
a permanent organization in which some individual is made re- 
sponsible for a group of homes. When a new family appears 
ahe is expected to report them promptly together with the new 
address of the family that moved out, if obtainable. Perma- 
nent organization along this line has been worked out in greater 
or less detail in Albany, Glens Falls, and Syracuse, N. Y., Coal- 
dale, Pa., Lansing, Mich., Plymouth, Ind., and Osage City, Kan. 
Other communities learn the names and addresses of newcomers 
in this manner but the actual solicitation is done by mail. What 

103 



the advantages of this plan are it is difficult to see; certainly 
they are not obvious. 

Still others reach these people by means of a special com- 
mittee, sometimes called "the vigilance committee." For ex- 
ample, a boy scouts' census may be taken once in three months, 
the boys going systematically street by street and listing the 
numbers of houses in which there are no war chest window 
cards. The houses are then checked up and the people seen 
by a special committee. One city is using the boy scouts en- 
tirely, not merely to take a survey of houses without war chest 
v/indow cards, but also to make the solicitations in such cases. 
This is not likely to produce large results, for while the boys 
are arduous workers, they are not skillful salesmen. The re- 
ply to this argument is that not much is produced in any event 
and that the reasons for doing the Vv^ork are chiefly moral rather 
than financial. 

Still other towns propose to have supplementary canvasses, 
about six months after their original drives, to reach newcomers 
and those who refused. Dayton, Ohio^ plans to make such an 
effort in order to round up newcomers and others. Melrose, 
Mass., has already worked out plans for a supplementary cam- 
paign in September. Salem, Mass., is doing this on a somewhat 
elaborate basis. The committee has about two thousand re- 
ports of persons who refused to subscribe, many of whom said 
that they intended to give to specific agencies. After the oppor- 
tunity to give to those agencies shall have passed, the commit- 
tee proposes to check up to see whether or not they have done 
as they proposed and then to go back to them as well as to many 
others in case of their failure. 

It is a much more difficult problem to deal with those who 
have made subscriptions but who have not given adequately. 
Broadly speaking, where the campaign has been thoroughly 
organized in advance these people should be dealt with, so far as 
they are to be reached at all at the time of the campaign rather 
than afterwards. However, where sufficient preliminary work 
has not been done the revision committee must check over the 
subscribers when the campaign is complete and do the best it 
can by means of special visitations to induce more adequate 
gifts. 

It is interesting to notice the estimates which those in 
charge of war chests have put upon the number who have failed 
to give and to give in proper amounts. Coaldale, Pa., reports 
that there is only one man who though able to do so has not 
contributed and that they propose to send committees to him at 
intervals until he does subscribe. 

Crawfordsville, Ind., estimates that tv/o hundred who were 
able to do so had not given and that others had not given as 
much as they could. These were to be solicited by a committee 
of twenty-one. Elwood figured that about three hundred peo- 

104 



pie had not done their part and proposed to go after them by 
systematic effort. Glens Falls, N. Y,, estimated that less than 
1% failed to contribute and the number being: small no effort 
will be made to reach them until the drive next year. Gran- 
ville, N. Y., reported about one hundred who might have given 
but did not do so. These are to be visited by a committee of 
five influential citizens. Herkimer, N. Y., estimates about five 
hundred, but believes that they are gradually falling into line 
voluntarily as the war progresses and its realities come home to 
them. Houghton, Mich., believes there are only twelve or four- 
teri who contributed nothing though able to make gifts. They 
will not be disturbed further. In some cases the Houghton 
M^ar chest received subscriptions smaller than it deemed proper. 
In such a case the subscription was simply returned with a re- 
quest for an increase in amount, which was complied with in 
numerous cases. Janesville, Wis., reports that about one in 
twenty-five did not contribute as they should and the commit- 
tee proposes to go after them "with j^ellow paint." Ambridge, 
Pa., reports not more than fifteen or twenty who failed to sub- 
scribe and that those who gave less than they ought are so few 
that nothing will be done until the next campaign. Lexington, 
Mass., believes that about five hundred failed to contribute as 
they should. Lowville, N. Y., estimates 1% and the committee 
plans to do nothing further on the ground that "they feel worse 
than we do." Michigan City, Ind,, says about 1% did not give 
and they are to be followed through the press, by mail, and by 
personal solicitation. The highest estimate comes from Roan- 
oke, Va., where is is said that 30% who could have contributed 
failed to do so. These are fair examples of the reports which 
came in, though the list is not absolutely complete. 

The temper of the methods to be employed in securing sup- 
plementary pledges shows the most striking variation. In sev- 
eral Western counties the names of those who refused to give 
or give adequately have been turned over to the county council 
of defense, which in many places is closely identified with and 
in some cases identical with the war chests. One of the report 
cards reads as follows : 

"To the Executive Committee of the War Work Committee of Licking 
County: 

We desire to report the name of , 

address , for such action as may be 

deemed advisable for conduct detrimental to the M^elfare of this 
community and our country, in that he w^ithout reason refused to 
give information for the survey, refused to buy Third Liberty 
Bonds, refused to contribute to the War Chest, made unpatriotic 
remarks." 

There is then space for the names of two workers and the team 
captain as well as the division leader, so that the report is 
thoroughly checked up before being submitted. 

105 



The number of war chests which are able to employ the 
county council of defense is relatively small. Most depend for 
the work upon a committee, frequently called the "vigilance 
committee" or "follow-up committee." 

Mail solicitation is not at all uncommon. A sample of let- 
ters used in this effort runs as follows, after the introductory 
statement : 

"Generally speaking, the contributions by citizens have been gen- 
erous. There are some, however, who do not seem to have appreciated 
either the importance of the work or its necessity. Those who do not 
pay to this fund or who do not contribute their full share of the 
amount which must be raised are simply shifting upon their neighbors 
and friends the burden of their own duty. After carefully examining 
all the information we have been able to obtain, we are unanimously 
of the opinion that the amount offered by you is not the share of this 
duty which should be borne by you. We are, however, extremely de- 
sirous that no injustice should be done and that the name of no person 
should be published in a way to bring adverse criticism either by 
reason of failure to contribute or by the inadequacy of the contribu- 
tion, and we earnestly request before any further action is taken on 
our part that you meet with this committee at our offices * * * and 
frankly discuss with us the pressing needs of our country and our city 
and your ability to meet those needs with generous loyalty." 

The committee in charge reported that this letter brought about 
three hundred revisions amounting to $40,000 for the war chest. 
Another letter of the sort runs as follows: 

a "In looking over the monthly pledge cards and conaparing yours 

with hundreds of others we are impressed with the idea that either 
you were not properly approached in the matter or that you do not 
correctly comprehend the supreme importance of the project. 

"We need not argue the necessity of sustaining the Y. M. C. A. 
and the Red Cross. They are recognized institutions, more important 
to the moral and physical welfare of our boys in khaki than any other 
feature of army life, and the sustaining of them by each of us in 
proportion to our ability should be considered a privilege as well as a 
duty.* * * It is the judgment of this committee that your monthly 

contribution to the cause should be $ , instead of $ 

We trust you will concur with us in this. It means much to our 
worthy cause, to our community, and to yourself as a loyal, patriotic 
citizen. 

"Will you therefore please sign the enclosed card, which will 
cancel any former pledge of a less amount, and promptly return it in 
the enclosed stamped and addressed envelope?" 

A letter used in a city which had done careful rating, re- 
ferred first to the discrepancy between the quota assigned and 
the subscription and went on to say: 

106 



"The variance is so great between the two amounts that this com- 
mittee feels there must be some misunderstanding somewhere for they 
do not believe that you want to be classed as one of those not willing 
to do their share in this conflict. * * * if you still feel that you cannot 
make the pledge for the amount of the quota we should be very glad 
to have you meet the committee during this week before a decision is 
made with regard to the matter." 

This letter brought very real results. 

One of the most interesting and perhaps significant feat- 
ures of these various letters is to be found in the fact that the 
committees in charge frequently reported that the failure to 
subscribe generously was due to misunderstanding, or to untact- 
ful solicitation in most cases rather than to deliberate intention 
to evade responsibility, and further that in many instances the 
difficulty was caused by a failure of the rating committee, 
which this plan allowed to be set right in a confidential fashion, 
thus avoiding any possibility of public humiliation. 

Another plan designed to increase subscriptions has been 
to use publicity of an appealing sort. Some have made a dis- 
tinct program of continuous publicity with regard to the va- 
rious agencies, their work, and their appeals, the intention be- 
ing to arouse in the minds of contributors a full realization of 
the vital character of the tasks undertaken by the war relief 
agencies cind to stimulate them through this means to voluntary 
contributions without anv actual solicitation. 



107 



CHAPTER FOUR. 



COLLECTIONS. 

The question of getting pledges is something less than half 
the battle. In the excitement of a well organized campaign it 
is in some instances almost as difficult to restrain some individ- 
uals to their proper scale of giving on a sacrificial basis as it is 
to get others to subscribe. The real key to the success of the 
war chest, from the financial point or view, comes in the de- 
velopment of successful and relatively frictionless methods of 
collection. 

Industrial Collections. 

Three plans have been devised for making collections from 
industrial groups. The first is to treat industrial employees 
simply as individual subscribers and ask them all to make vol- 
untary payment, either at the war chest office or through the 
bank, precisely in the same manner as those who subscribe 
through the homes division. The second method is to treat 
them as a group, organizing them into clubs or associations, of- 
ten with some catchy name, which shall have their own treas- 
urers through whom payments are made. The third metliod 
is to lay emphasis upon group collections through employers 
who are authorized to deduct the amount from pay envelopes 
and turn in the whole in one check at stated intervals. The 
first plan is followed in relatively few cities of any large in- 
dustrial importance. Perhaps the most conspicuous is Salem, 
Mass., where all payments from whatever source are made 
through one office. It is probably too early as yet to say exact- 
ly what experience is going to develop in this instance though 
thus far collections have been satisfactory. Easton, Pa., is also 
using this plan, all subscribers, industrial as well as others, 
paying at the war chest headquarters. 

The most notable illustration of the use of voluntary clubs 
or associations for industrial collections is Philadelphia. In 
that city any plant with more than twenty five employees organ- 
izes its own collection unit on a voluntary basis. A regular con- 
stitution for each war chest society is furnished it by the com- 
mittee in charge and reads as follows : 

"This society shall be known as the War Chest Society. Its object 

shall be to enroll every employee of as a member of the 

War Welfare Council, and to obtain from each employee a pledge to con- 
tribute a certain sum per month for a period of one year, beginning July 

108 



1, 1918, for the objects and aims of the War Welfare Council of Philadel- 
phia. Its further object is to secure and retain the house emblem for 100 
per cent, membership offered by the Executive Committee of the War 
Welfare Council. 

The officers shall be a President, a Secretary, and a Treasurer, who 

shall be elected by the employees of on or before May 18, 

1918. 

The duties of the President shall be to preside at all meetings of the 
organization and to assume direct charge of all its activities. 

The duties of the Secretary shall be to keep correct minutes of all 
meetings, to issue and post such notices as sihall be necessary to further 
the work of the organization, and to keep an accurate list of the members 
of and the amount of their pledges. 

The duties of the Treasurer shall be to keep an accurate duplicate 
record of the Secretary's list of members and the amount of their pledges, 

to collect each month from each member of the War Chest 

Society the sum pledged, and to turn over to the Treasurer of the Wiar 
Welfare Council (Drexel & Company, Fifth and Chestnut Streets) the ag- 
gregate of such monthly collections. 

Each and every employee of is by virtue of said em- 
ployment a member of the War Chest Society until May 

27, 1918, but forfeits said member&hip if by that date he has not signed a 
pledge card of the War Welfare Council. Full membership privileges for 

the year ending June 30, 1919, attaches to each employee of the 

who is a pledged monthly contributor to the War Chest, and who from 
month to month keeps in good standing by making the pledged payments. 

Should any one who is on May 27, 1918, a bona-fide member of the 

War Chest Society leave to be identified with another 

institution, he can retain his membership in the _ War Chest 

Society by continuing his payments through said Society, or if he leaves 
to accept employment with an institution where there is a War Chest 
Society, he may at his option transfer his membership, and any person 

entering the employ of the during the year ending June 

30, 1919, may become a member of War Chest Society 

by transferring his membership from some other War Chest Society, or by 

paying through the War Chest Society any amount he has 

pledged to the War Welfare Council. 

The responsibility of the. War Chest Society is indi- 
vidual, and not joint, to the Treasurer of the War Welfare Council for the 
amount pledged by said Society. 

It is the duty of the organization through itS' officers to transmit to 
the Treasurer of the War Welfare Council (Drexel & Company) an accu- 
rate record of any changes in membership." 

In that city the pledge cards signed by employees are kept 
by the treasurer of the club, and a club pledge card stating the 
total of individual pledges and the number of subscribers is 
sent to the war chest headquarters. When the amount which 

109 



is collected by the treasurer is more or less than the amount 
v/hich the club is supposed to pay that month, it is necessary that 
a memorandum should accompany the payment to explain fully 
the difference. If new subscriptions have been received the 
number of subscribers and total amount must be stated in its 
correct form. If subscribers have left an effort should be made, 
not only to report the decrease in number and amount, but to 
indicate where the person has gone and send in his individual 
pledge card. 

Other cites employ similar plans to some extent, though 
not as their main reliance; for example, Columbus, which in 
most instances, collects its industrial pledges through deduction 
from payroll, found that in one or two cases the concern was 
unwilling to undertake the task or the employees objected for 
some reason. In such cases the representatives of the war chest 
went to the employees, explained to them the economy and sav- 
ing resulting from group collections and the consequent increase 
in the amount available to help the soldiers. The result was 
that the employees, recognizing the force of this, selected an 
individual as treasurer to whom they agreed to make payments. 
Usually he was a person of prestige among them, one to whom 
they looked for favors or advancement, and not simply a person 
of neither standing or importance. Under these circumstances, 
the results of collection have been surprisingly good, indeed 
almost as good as under the plan of making the deductions from 
the payroll. Meriden also has employed this idea in certain 
instances and Seymour adopted this method in some factories 
where the deduction scheme could not be installed. In many 
cities there are enough Federal employees, so that it is very 
desirable to have them grouped in units for purposes of collec- 
tion. The Government, however, will not undertake the task 
of making deductions from pay envelopes. Dayton, Ohio, there- 
fore, organized these into voluntary collection units on the 
Philadelphia principle and met with very good success indeed. 

It is very naturally better to have a uniform and standard 
plan of making industrial collections where possible, but the idea 
of making deductions from payrolls is one which must be 
definitely "sold". It cannot be left to inference or just merely 
mentioned. It must be carefully explained to employee and 
employer. The reasons must be carefully set forth, chief among 
them economy, with emphasis upon the fact that the greater the 
economy, the less money will be absorbed in expenses and the 
more released for the agencies which the w^ar chest is designed 
to assist. However, if in a few plants it is impossible to install 
the deduction system, the voluntary association is distinctly the 
next best and should be employed. 

Save for these few instances, there is practical unanimity 
in industrial areas in the system of having collections made 
through deductions from pay envelopes. 

110 



Most cities have applied this plan to factories and public 
utilities. There is no reason why it should not be applied to 
stores, public employees, mines; in short it should be applied 
to every possible group, for example, to teachers. For special 
groups of considerable size the war chest can well afford to 
make extraordinary provisions. In many cities, for instance, 
teachers are not paid twelve months in the year, but only nine 
months or ten months. The deductions from their pay en- 
velopes should be adjusted on that basis so that payments will 
fall only within the period when salary is being drawn. Roch- 
ester applied this principle with large success. 

In the second place payments should be allowed at the most 
convenient period in the month, for the factory employees of 
different plants are paid on different days and at different 
intervals. This should be taken into account since instead of 
complicating the situation, as one might suppose at first glance, 
it serves instead to distribute work at the war chest office more 
evenly through the month and becomes a distinct advantage. 

Many cities have made the mistake of thinking that it is 
not worth while to organize group collections for less than 
twenty-five people and that has been the usual minimum. The 
experience of several cities, notably Columbus, Ohio, is that it 
is decidedly worth while to make group collections from units 
very much smaller than twenty-five, getting down in some cases 
even as low as five. This plan reaches large numbers of people 
and operates as a substantial guarantee against delinquency, 
simplifies bookkeeping and proves a convenience both to the 
individuals involved and to the war chest. 

There has been only one city Vv^hich reported serious friction 
in connection with the deduction method of making collections. 
This v/as a small community with a war chest which was ad- 
mittedly imperfectly organized, and with one dominant industry 
engaged in war work employing 7000 or 8000 men, many of 
whom are not residents of the war chest communii:y but are 
commuters. Many others are unskilled laborers who boarded 
in the community. At the time of the original campaign sub- 
scriptions were taken and the officers of the factory agreed to 
the deduction method. Shortly afterward large numbers of the 
employees were discharged pending a decision from the Gov- 
ernment as to the type of gun to be manufactured and for sev- 
eral months work was slow. During this period the factory 
withdrew its consent to make deductions from the payroll and 
refused also to allow a re-canvass of the factory after new con- 
tracts had restored full-time activity. This case seems to be 
distinctly an exception to the general rule and one for which 
local conditions are responsible. It does not seem that there is 
any reason to believe that similar trouble will result in other 
communities from the adoption of the deduction plan of mak- 
ing collections. 

Ill 



Frequency of Deductions. 

Wherever employees are willing to authorize deduction of 
their subscriptions from their pay, the problem must be faced 
as to the frequency with which such deductions shall be made. 
Most cities which report have weekly deductions, several 
monthly deductions, a few provide for both weekly and month- 
ly, giving an option between them, and two give t le employee 
free hand to designate precisely how he wishes the deduction 
to be made. 

The wisest practice in this regard is to have a deduction 
made every payday with one exception, which will be dealt with 
in a moment, — thus it may be monthly, bi-weekly, or weekly. 

The exception comes in the case of weekly deductions and 
rises from the fact that there are some months in which five 
paydays occur. Inasmuch as not all factories pay on the same 
day, these months are not uniform in any city. The deductions 
in such months should be made only on four paydays, the fifth 
having no deduction. This means that there will be forty- 
eight equa] installments, four installments being paid each 
month. 

The advantage of this plan is that it distributes the bur- 
den as evenly as may be possible, so that the subscriber does 
not feel the payments as severely as he would if deductions 
were m.ade only at infrequent intervals. The objection to it is 
that it makes some work for the employer, but this can be reduced 
to a minimum if the installments are all equal and if a proper 
card is provided on which the paymaster can check the weeks 
in which deductions are made. 

The remittance from the factory to the war chest office 
should be monthly and not at each payday. This is in order 
that the war chest may not be given too much bookkeeping to 
handle. This also furnishes another reason why the deduction 
should be made only four times in the month when there are 
five paydays in the month, namely, that otherwise the amount 
of money to be credited to any individual subscriber would vary 
from month to month and make more elaborate bookkeeping 
requisite. 

The only disadvantage associated with this monthly remit- 
tance, weekly deduction program is that a man may be partly 
delinquent in some month. For example, if he should leave 
the employ of the factory after two weeks of the current month, 
or if he were out sick for a week, etc. This would necessitate 
some slight complication of the bookkeeping in the war chest 
office in posting to his account but does not make much extra 
work for the employer, save as he has to make a memorandum 
to the war chest office and a memorandum to deduct an extra 
amount at the next time. 

112 



In this connection it is proper to point out that many 
cities have adopted the plan of having factories remit at differ- 
ent times through the month in order to distribute the labor 
involved in bookkeeping evenly. 

Patriotic Half-Hour. 

Kenosha, Wisconsin, developed the plan of taking sub- 
scriptions on the basis of what a man earned in half an hour 
and then using a designated half-hour each week as a means 
of keeping alive interest in the war chest and expressing the 
detemiination on the part of the citizens to support the Gov- 
ernment in the conduct of the war. On Wednesday of every 
week the half-hour from 11.30 a. m. until noon is set aside by 
proclamation of the mayor as the period when Kenosha is work- 
ing for the soldiers and sailors. Factory whistles announce its 
commencement and appropriate exercises are held regularly 
in the schools at that time. 

After somewhat more than six months operation, Kenosha 
reports that this feature of the war chest has been a very de- 
cided success and has served as a constant stimulus to patriotism 
as well as to payments. It is unquestionably true that payments 
on the industrial side are made more cheerfully and on the vol- 
untary side are made more regularly if there is no let-up in the 
educative campaign. This plan has been followed by a number 
of cities, among them Attleboro, Mass., Burlington, Iowa, and 
Elgin, 111. 

Some cities use a patriotic hour instead of half-hour, the 
reason being that the half-hour represents 1%: of the average 
individuals wages, which is thought by some to be an inadequate 
amount, and they use, therefore, an hour which represents 2%. 
The principle is the same in either case and the idea is equally 
applicable. 

The employment of this plan of having men subscribe the 
wages earned in a patriotic hour or half-hour immediately raises 
the question as to precisely how those earnings are to be figured, 
whether it is to be taken literally and figured down to the last 
odd cent, or whether in order to simplify bookkeeping an even 
amount is chosen ; whether, if a man works on piecework, he 
is to give the amount he earns in that specific half-hour or an 
average half-hour. Practically all of the cities figure what 
a man m.akes in the average half-hour, not in the specific one 
which is set aside. Some carry it even further and figure the 
monthly average. 

There is the disadvantage in this plan that a man's pledge 
is not for a uniform amount. Wlien he works on piecework, 
his wages will vary from week to week and his pledge as well, 
thus it will bring in a few cents more one month or a few cents 
less. In like manner if he is working for a fixed wage and 
receives a raise, this brings an alteration in the amount of his 

113 



pledge. These circumstances make it practically impossible for 
the war chest office to keep separate accounts for these men. 
It becomes necessary, if this plan is used, to carry an account 
simply for the factory and to depend upon the carbon of the 
factory receipt in order to check the total which the factory 
returns to the war chest. 

This is the more true because what actually happens is that 
the factories deduct each payday. The factories have different 
paydays and so the five-payment months are different in the 
different factories. For the war chest office to attempt to 
follow this in each factory and keep record of individual ac- 
counts of the subscribers would involve an amount of book- 
keeping that is practically prohibitive in some cases. 

Occasionally when a time basis is used, the subscription is 
worked out in overtime effort. This cannot, however, be made 
in most cases a war chest policy, because certain unions will 
not permit it and because some factories are not in a position 
to use overtime labor now. 

The conclusion which one comes to, after study of the 
material submitted by cities using this plan, is that, in the first 
place, it is satisfactory to those communities which use it and 
that in the second place, it does have large educative and patriot- 
ic effect. The difficulties have been emphasized because if 
they are foreseen, careful planning may obviate them. The im- 
portant point is to make certain that if this plan is followed, 
no feature, whether of bookkeeping or other detail, is intro- 
duced which is inconsistent with it. 

Labor Turn-over — The problem of taking care of labor 
turn-over is one which has been given a good deal of careful at- 
tention by officials in charge of war chests and a number of 
plans have been developed for obviating the difficulties that 
arise from changes in the personnel of establishments. 

It is possible to overestimate the importance of labor turn- 
over just as it is possible to underestimate the importance of 
this question. As one glances at statistics of factories and 
notices a turn-over of fifty or even one hundred per cent, it 
seems off-hand that the method of taking care of labor turn- 
over, especially in view of the large number of employees who 
subscribe, would become the most vital feature of a war chest, 
and at the same time a problem of such complexity as to be 
almost insoluble. As a matter of fact these statistics give a 
false impression. Perhaps eighty per cent, of the employees of 
most well-regulated establishments are stable. It is the other 
twenty per ceiit. which turns over and over and produces the 
large aggregate percentage. Moreover the twenty per cent, (a 
factor which is extremely rough and selected simply for con- 
venience) is that portion which gives the smallest amount of 
money, because the turn-over is more rapid among the unskilled 
help whose contributions are not large relative to the total. 

114 



The experience of Syracuse illustrates this point. The war 
chest did not develop in its first year of operation a complete 
or thorough scheme for taking care of labor turn-over and there 
was in consequence a shrinkage from this cause which amount- 
ed to about 15%. 

Now, however, a number of plans have been elaborated. 
The most drastic is that which was developed in Youngstown, 
Ohio. When a man gives notice that he is to leave the mill 
the total unpaid remainder of his pledge is deducted from his 
last pay envelope so that when he reaches his new employment 
his account has been settled for the year. This plan appears 
to be . one which is likely to be effective but it seems doubtful 
whether it will prove popular with the givers and whether it 
will engender good feeling for the inevitable campaign the next 
year. 

The second method has been worked out in Detroit. In- 
stead of attempting to follow the individual contributor from 
one industrial concern to another through the office of the pa- 
triotic fund, each factory has been asked to underwrite the sub- 
scriptions of all its employees. Thus when one man leaves the 
factory and is replaced by another it becomes to the interests of 
factory to solicit the newcomer. Otherwise it has to meet the 
payments on the pledge of his predecessor. This method, which 
is extremely simple, reduces the amount of bookkeeping which 
the war chest has to handle and precludes all necessity for any 
elaborate and more or less expensive scheme for following work- 
ers from one employment to another. It has been applied to 
about eighty per cent, of the factory subscriptions, the other 
twenty per cent, being employed for the most part in small con- 
cerns where labor turn-over is not great and has not, in conse- 
quence, so important a bearing. Under this plan the factory 
does not lose a great deal if it maintains its organization for 
solicitation, and what it does lose is more than made up to it 
from the fact that the corporations, as in Detroit, are not asked 
for subscriptions as such, though individual members of the 
firm are asked to make personal contributions. 

The third method is the one which is employed in Torring- 
ton. Under the plan in operation there virtually no effort of a 
serious character is made to transfer a man's pledge when he 
changes from one employer to another. Instead the entire em- 
phasis is put upon obtaining a subscription from each person 
who is hired — that is, to maintain each factory 100% subscribed 
to the war chest. The employment manager in the chief con- 
cern in talking vfith new men asks them if they are willing to 
sign pledge cards, but does not ask for signatures, though he 
does pass them some of the explanatory pamphlets. When a 
man goes to work the foreman of the department promptly ap- 
proaches him with a pledge card. This does not mean that a 
man will not be hired if he does not express his willingness to 

115 



sign, but it does mean that he will have had time to think it 
over and will understand the situation so that he will know what 
the solicitation is about when he is approached. Experience 
under this plan has been satisfactory. The largest concern in 
the city had a 100% subscription at the time of the war chest 
campaign and at present (August 14, 1918) is still 100% sub- 
scribed despite a considerable labor turn-over. Other concerns 
are doing as well. The net result is an inexpensive and yet very 
efficient method of caring for this problem. Inasmuch as the 
war chest office does not carry a separate account for every 
individual subscriber but has a ledger account for each factory 
only, the cancellation of pledges of those who leave the employ 
of the factory does not unduly complicate bookkeeping. 

The fourth method, like the third, is applicable to cities 
which do not carry a separate ledger account for each of the 
industrial subscribers but simply one account for each factory 
or other unit. Under this system the treasurer has forms for 
a transfer list. The factory reports on these forms those who 
are leaving and sends in to the war chest the card authorizing 
the employer to deduct the amount of the subscription and on 
the back of which is a ledger statement of the account. When 
that authorization card reaches the war chest office it is put in 
a transfer drawer and the reports of factories are scrutinized 
for the appearance of the name on some list of incoming em- 
ployees. If the name fails to appear on the incoming lists a 
form letter is sent. Utica, N. Y., sent a form letter which 
read: 

"We have been advised by the Company that you 

have left its employ, and as payments to the War Chest Fund are now 
due, we would thank you to advise us as to the manner in which you 
desire to continue payments. For your information they may be made 
in the following manner: deducted from your wages by your present 
employer in accordance with the authorization card signed by you. 
If you wish this method followed, kindly advise us the name of your 
present employer. 

"Payments may also be made monthly, quarterly, or semi-annually 
in advance at the office of the War Chest Association. 

"Please refer to this letter when you write and bring it with you 
when you call." 

In other cities a member of the permanent campaign organiza- 
tion or one of the Boy Scouts was sent to the home address to 
ask the new place of employment. When that is ascertained 
either through the letter or through the messenger, the authori- 
zation card is sent to the new employer, who may deduct for 
any period which is in arrears from the fi^st or second pay 
envelope. 

The fifth method is virtually the same and is used in cities 
which carry a separate ledger account for each subscriber. In 

116 



Rochester, for example, the ledger cards are filed in the same 
order in which the factory reports payment, and each month 
when the factory payment comes in there appears a list of 
those who have left its employ. The ledger cards of those men 
are withdrawn from the classified file and put in a transfer or 
tracer drawer. These are checked over with the incoming lists 
from other factories and sorted into their proper places in the 
file. 

In Columbus, Dayton, and certain other cities there are 
regularly organized investigation departments, usually with 
paid employees who attempt to follow those who disappear from 
their previous places of employment. In this case an investi- 
gation slip is miade up from the data available on the pledge card 
and the outgoing list sent by the factory. The slip is then 
given to a paid investigator for report. Indianapolis made an 
arrangement with one of the local newspapers by which its 
district circulation managers act as the investigators for the 
war chest. This gives them an available force of thirty inves- 
tigators at a cost of less than $300.00 a month. 

Occasionally cities have adopted the plan of putting on a 
list the names of those who appear on the records as leaving 
and making a corresponding list for those who appear on the 
records as new employees. It is far better to do this with a 
card system, for then when a man is traced his card can be 
withdrawn and there will be no crossing out or checking, which 
makes it necessary to write his name in again, and the list will 
not become clumsy. 

Statistics as to the actual importance of labor turn-over 
and the success attained in dealing with it are very difficult to 
secure. Indianapolis reports that in forty-five days three thous- 
and employees changed their places of employment without ad- 
vising their former employers where they were going and with- 
out appearing on any incoming lists promptly. These men 
were at first sent letters asking them to fill out return post 
cards stating their present places of employment. This took 
care of most of them. The small percentage remaining were 
turned over to the investigators and most of them appear to 
have been found. In Utica, a city of 80,000 population, there 
were about 4,500 cases which had to be traced between the 15th 
of February and the 15th of June. 3,000 of these were found 
without much difficulty. The others had entered the service 
or left town, or had moved as well as changed employment, and 
could not be readily traced. Columbus reports that it has been 
possible to trace practically all cases and they have resolved 
themselves into four classes: first, those who have entered the 
service and whose pledges are cancelled ; second, those who have 
left town and whose pledges are cancelled ; third, those who from 
illness or other circumstances are temporarily unemployed and 

117 



who will have to be followed up again; and, fourth, the large 
majority who have been placed and are now making their pay- 
ments through their new employers. 

Labor Unions — The use of labor unions for collection has 
been more or less restricted, the cities which employ this meth- 
od being in a distinct minority. For the most part its use has 
been developed in the seasonal trades, such as carpentry, brick- 
laying, etc., particularly where a workman is not regularly con- 
nected with one employer. The unions in such cases make the 
collections and transmit in one check. Cities which have em- 
ployed this method are Albuquerque, N. M., Butte, Mont., De- 
troit, Mich., Kenosha and Racine, Wis., Roanoke, Va., in one 
case, and Sheboygan, Wis. 

This is a method which in such trades is valuable because 
of the fact that there is such a very large amount of labor turn- 
over, which it would be almost impossible to follow. Of course 
the collection through the union obviates the necessity for fol- 
lowing men from one employer to another. 

The one drawback to using this plan in practice, though not 
in principle, is that the labor unions have usually not taken real 
subscriptions but have levied assessments, which has a tendency 
to destroy to some degree at least the gift character of contri- 
butions. 

Personal Collections. 

Collections by Solicitors — The question whether solicitors 
should make collections in conjunction with their work of taking 
subscriptions is one which has had a good deal of attention. 
The argument in favor of the practice is that is has a tendency 
to make the person subscribing have a sense of the reality of 
his pledge if he makes a payment along with it and that it 
serves as a demonstration of sincerity. The argument against 
having the solicitor make the collection is partly practical and 
partly psychological. The practical objection comes from the 
fact that in the great rush of handling thousands of subscrip- 
tions in one week through voluntary and unskilled help there 
are certain to be a great many errors in accounting if the prac- 
tice of allowing solicitors to make collections is adopted. In 
one concrete instance a much over-burdened treasurer was of- 
fered the assistance of a group of business men who agreed to 
take care of the money attached to about a thousand pledge 
cards. They made up the bank deposits but neglected the detail 
of posting the payments to the accounts of the subscribers. It 
took a great deal of detective work on the part of the treasurer 
to find out who had made payments because the solicitors who 
had done the collecting were not always careful to write up on 
the card or, if they did, to indicate how much had been paid, 
contenting themselves simply with fastening the money to the 
card. 

118 



The psychological arg-ument arises from the fact that peo- 
ple are very wary about giving money to strangers. In the heat 
of a campaign, particularly in a city of some size where from 
three to five thousand solicitors are mobilized, it is difficult to 
make certain that there are no impostors, and the public, aware 
of that fact, hesitates to pay in some cases. This argument is 
one of some force, but not decisive because almost always an 
option is given in the matter of payment, so that those who do 
not care to make payment need not. 

Wherever solicitors are authorized to take money the great- 
est care should be used to have the solicitor identified with a 
suitable badge which is numbered, registered, and readily rec- 
ognizable. In the second place, the solicitor should give not a 
permanent receipt but simply a temporary receipt which can 
be turned in for the first payment when due and which should 
be made out in triplicate, the subscriber getting the original, 
the war chest the first copy, and the solicitor the second copy 
to produce in case a question should arise later. Every solicitor 
should have strongly impressed upon him that he must leave a 
receipt whether the person desires one or not. 

Cleveland took pains to have two cards to which money 
could be attached, a yellow card and a blue card. The yellow 
card was used to record money which was paid on a pledge 
previously turned in : the blue card was used for money turned 
in with the pledge, a distinction which is important in avoiding 
duplication in the auditor's office and consequently complicat- 
ing a situation which is not easy to deal with under the very 
best of circumstances. Another city developed a plan which, 
if collection by solicitors are allowed, should be followed. Each 
solicitor was given a number of good, stout manilla envelopes 
sufficiently large to contain the pledge card without folding. 
Each cash payment was to be enclosed with the pledge card and 
a carbon copy of the receipt in a separate envelope and sealed. 
There was a space on the outside on which to note exactly what 
was included. The advantages of this were that there was no 
danger of the pledge card and the money being separated. All 
too frequently v/hen they are pinned or clipped together they 
become loosened in the shuffle and difficulty arises. This 
plan also made it possible for the auditor's office when rushed 
to lay these envelopes aside for a few days since there was no 
particular danger of their becoming dishevelled. 

A number of cities, notably Rochester, N. Y., absolutely 
prohibited the collection of any money by solicitors, allowing 
only pledges to come in during the week of the campaign. 

The conclusion which a survey of the practices of cities 
with comments on results induces is that the collection of money 
by solicitors is undesirable. The bookkeeping problems in- 
volved in the war chest are sufficiently serious so that the 
treasurer's office should be relieved of as much pressure as 

119 



possible at the beginning of its work. To make out ledger ac- 
counts for several thousand people and start a set of books 
and at the same time to have to take in a great deal of money 
and credit it to accounts which have not yet been set up, is an 
extraordinarily difficult thing to do with accuracy. Personal 
observation in several war chest offices and the earnest advice 
of office managers have impressed this upon me forcibly. It is 
perhaps not wholly wise, on the other hand, to prohibit collec- 
tions absolutely, though it is well worth while to discourage 
payments at the time of giving the pledge. 

Centralized Collections — Some war chest cities have made 
an effort to make all collections through one office. For ex- 
ample, Burlington, Iowa, has "them call at the office as a pa- 
triotic duty" and made a feature of that practice. Carlo, 111., 
at first attempted to have payments made through the various 
banks. For some reason the plan did not work out and all now 
pay directly to the office of the war chest. The same plan is 
used in Cumberland, Md., Dayton, 0., Glens Falls, Herkimer, 
Hinckley, Lockport, and Newark, N. Y., Meriden, Racine, Wis., 
Savannah, Ga., Salem, Mass., and others. Lansing, Mich., uses 
a centralized plan of collection so far as city pledges are con- 
cerned, but the county divisions each take care of their own 
local collectrons and the work is to that extent decentralized. 

The most interesting case of those making centralized col- 
lections is that of Salem, Mass., where all payments are made at 
one office, there being no effort to have a separate industrial 
collection and no system of unit or group collection of any sort. 
Every subscriber — and there are about ten thousand of them — 
is expected to call once a month at the centrally located war 
chest office in order to make his payments. 

Ely, Minn., has selected the city treasurer as the war chest 
treasurer and the citizens pay their light and water bills and war 
chest subscriptions to the same person at the same time. 

It must be remembered that in almost all these cases of 
centralized collection not all subscribers pay in person. Ordi- 
narily the great mass of subscribers pay through their employ- 
ers or through their banks by means of bank drafts, or through 
their unions, so that the actual number of subscribers who are 
expected to call at the central^ office is normally not over 30% 
of the total and very frequently runs very much lower than 
that figure. 

The advisability of using one central office for making 
collections depends of course upon the question of the area 
which the war chest covers and also upon the number of sub- 
scribers who are to pay directly. 

Decentralized Collections — Other cities have worked out 
plans for decentralizing collections in order to make it as con- 
venient as possible for subscribers. Ordinarily this is done 
through the use of banks, but occasionally also stores or even 

120 



individuals are employed. The plan has been worked out on 
what appears to be the largest scale in the city of Detroit. 
The patriotic fund there has 640 collection agencies which are 
designated to the public through newspaper advertisements and 
by large signs hung in the windows. Practically all drug stores 
are payment offices. This body of collection agencies is sup- 
posed to reach about 100,000 people, whose aggregate gifts 
amounts to $2,500,000. These collection agencies have a tripli- 
cate receipt, the original of which goes to the subscriber, the 
first copy to the war chest headquarters, and the second remains 
with the collection agent. They are properly numbered, so 
that while this plan makes somewhat more bookkeeping in the 
aggregate it does not make more for the central office. Rather 
it makes it possible to spread the work out in that office much 
more satisfactorily. At Terre Haute likewise this plan was 
developed and there are 130 authorized pay stations which in- 
clude many local banks as well as many stores. A number of 
cities have adopted the plan of having all agencies which make 
collections for the gas company and electric light company 
receive payments on the ground that people visit those comjTan- 
ies once a month in any case and thus payment to the war chest 
is made as convenient as possible. 

Philadelphia because of the great area involved in its war 
chest plan had to develop some such scheme. It has confined 
itself however to banks. All banks both national and state are 
authorized to make collection. They are known at war chest 
headquarters by their American Banking Association number 
and send in records of payments but keep the money on deposit 
until it is withdrawn by the treasurer. 

In the case of collections made through banks the common 
practice is to allow the bank to keep on deposit the money which 
is paid in until it is needed by the treasurer. This makes pos- 
sible a distribution of the funds among the banks. In general, 
of course, a person pays his war chest subscription at his own 
bank and this keeps the funds stable. One city adopted the 
plan of depositing with each bank the checks drawn ifpon it in 
order to distribute the funds equitably. The only dissatisfac- 
tion that has resulted from the employment of banks as collec- 
tion agencies comes from the fact that banking hours being 
short they are not always wholly convenient for subscribers. 
Beyond that there has been no complaint of any sort save in 
one case, where for some reason unexplained the collection 
through the banks broke down and centralized collections was 
substituted successfully. 

Cities which have adopted a decentralized method of col- 
lection are Adrian, Albany, Albion, Attleboro, Ashland, Billings, 
Brattleboro, Dayton, Elkhart, Granville, Lo-wville, Melrose, 
Michigan City, Mitchell, Moline, Northampton, Nutley, Sheboy- 
gan, Vevay, Warren, Westfield, and others. 

121 



Methods of Payment — Where payments are made at the 
war chest office or at banks, there has to be developed some 
routine for handling them. 

In Syracuse the subscriber went to the cashier's window, 
dictated his name and address, which were written down by the 
cashier who then accepted payment. A good many cities follow 
this practice because they believe that numbers of those who 
pay in the voluntary list are not accustomed to carrying bank 
accounts and do not fill out accurately their payment slips. 

A number of other cities, on the other hand, make use of 
a payment slip, or deposit slip, like a bank deposit slip and they 
report that slips which are filled out inaccurately can be return- 
ed for correction or can be corrected by the cashier and that 
the number of mistakes is not so great that it warrants them 
in adopting the slower method of having the cashier make out 
slips. Such cities, therefore, have a regular deposit slip, oc- 
casionally with a coupon attached which the subscriber makes 
out also and which is then stamped by the cashier and returned 
as a receipt. Terre Haute used a deposit slip which took a car- 
bom copy, the carbon being stamped by the cashier as a receipt, 
the original being retained at the war chest office. 

At Tarrytown the subscriber brings in a certificate of 
enlistment which is marked off with spaces for months from 
May 1918 to December 1920 and there is a stamp which is put 
in the monthly space which reads "received dues for this month 
on the number of memberships indicated," the number of mem- 
berships at $1.00 a month being permanently entered at the top 
of the certificate. 

Salem, Mass., and Philadelphia have developed systems of 
numbered coupons. In Salem twelve coupons bearing identical 
numbers at top and bottom were sent to each subscriber in an 
envelope. On making payments one of these coupons must be 
properly made out and presented with the money. In case of 
failure to bring the proper coupon, there is available on the 
counter a coupon of distinctive color upon which the subscriber's 
number i§ entered by the clerk who ascertains it from an alpha- 
betical file. This system appeared to work out very well and 
the number of people who failed to bring their slips was rela- 
tively few. 

Philadelphia's system was somewhat similiar. The cou- 
pons were made up into a book, the cover and first two sheets 
being of sufficiently thin material that they could be typed at 
one operation with use of carbon. The cover bears the name of 
the subscriber, the number of his division, his individual number 
within the division, as well as his address. This identifies the 
book if it is lost and provision is made for its return to the war 
chest office by any finder. The first carbon is a ledger card, 
the second is a card to be used for follow-up purposes ; the suc- 
ceeding coupons are numbered identically and serially so that 

122 



even if an individual neglected to write his name or the month 
of payment, these could readily be ascertained. The bank simp- 
ly stamps a receipt on the stub and forwards the coupon to the 
war chest office, keeping the money on deposit until drawn by 
the treasurer. 

It is felt by cities which employ this device that it has good 
psychological value and that it indicates the importance of the 
matter. It is believed also that in Philadelphia the division 
into districts is going to allow the war chest officials to keep 
track of how various groups of subscribers meet their obliga- 
tions and to determine where shrinkage comes. Thus they will 
have a good index as to whether the organization which handled 
that group fell down in its selling program or is falling down 
in its follow-up program. The idea is that it will enable the 
central council to determine accurately where failure develops 
and so trace it down and remedy it. 

Some cities have employed as reminder for collection pur- 
poses a monitor which has become standardized as a commercial 
proposition. It consists of a calendar with twelve coupons each 
with space to indicate the date and number of payment. When 
a person wishes to make payment, he clips the proper coupon 
and sends or takes it with his money to the war chest. When 
the coupon is clipped, it discloses beneath a conspicuous sign 
which reads "My pledge for the month of June is paid." No 
city has yet reported how well the scheme works out. At first 
glance it would seem that people who fall delinquent would re- 
move the calendar from the wall. 

Experience With Voluntary Payments. 

It is perfectly obvious that the critical point in the matter 
of collections comes with regard to that portion which is paid 
by individuals either at the war chest office or through some 
collection agency. A question as to the success met with in 
regard to voluntary paymicnts brought a response from most 
of the cities. The great majority wrote the word 'simply 
"good", Burlington, Iowa, says "very good", Elgin, 111., "excel- 
lent", Kenosha, Wis., "99.9% 0. K.", Michigan City "the real 
thing", Syracuse, N. Y., found that there was apparently to be 
a large shrinkage in the case of voluntary payments. Analysis 
showed, however, that it was due to deaths, enlistments, remov- 
als, and failure to organize a proper system of industrial col- 
lection. They believe that the money from the remainder, 
which after all is the group involved, will be collected up to 
98% of the total, an extraordinary total and evidence of the 
way in which the matter was followed up in the newspapers 
for no collectors were used and bills were not sent for several 
months. 

Utica, N. Y., said there were perhaps 2500 delinquents 

123 



out of 35,000 in the period from the 15th of February to the 
15th of June, no bills having been sent out, no collectors having 
been used, the only work of a follow-up nature being newspa- 
per publicity. Glens Falls found that 10% of the people became 
delinquent to a greater or less extent in three months, no effort 
having been made up to that time to follow them up. 

Certain cities, on the other hand, have not had equally en- 
couraging experience with voluntary payments. Osage City 
reports "voluntary collections are no good" ; Terre Haute re- 
ports "a large number of delinquents to contend with under the 
voluntary collection plan." 

In almost every case where there are delinquents they are 
among the smaller subscribers so that while the numbers look 
serious in some cases, the money value is seldom considerable; 
for example, Melrose found that in three collections there were 
about five hundred delinquents but the total delinquency was 
only $600 and after notices v/ere sent out half of them came in 
promptly. 

Despite the relatively small amount of these delinquencies 
in value, it is well worth while to install a good follow-up system 
for its moral and educative effect. Those in charge of the war 
chest in Columbus believe that the real key to good collections 
is in continued educational M^ork and that, roughly, the percen- 
tage of delinquents is an index of the slackness of educational 
effort. 

The city of Elkhart developed a novel plan to stimulate 
prompt collection and to keep the war chest idea alive among 
people. In that city every subscriber, whether his money was 
deducted by his employer or whether he paid in person at the 
war chest office, was given a button of distinctive color for each 
payment. This did not cost much and it was found that when 
folks began to blossom out with buttons each month the delin- 
quents were stimulated to go down and get their buttons too. 

Voluntary Units — Two or three cities have applied the plan 
of group collections to individual subscribers as well as to in- 
dustrial subscribers. These were organized into clubs or asso- 
ciations and elect their own treasurers and make payments 
through them after the fashion of the war saving societies and 
liberty bond clubs, etc. 

In the Columbus war chest there are a number of such 
groups containing from ten to eighty subscribers who have signi- 
fied their intention to pay through some farmer, grain dealer, 
or storekeeper in their vicinity. These groups were handled in 
exactly the same way as the employees of a store or factory who 
allow deductions from their pay. The war chest sends out 
shortly before the first of the month a unit collection sheet 
which is virtually a statement of account. It shows the name, 
the amount due on the approaching first of the month, the delin- 
quency, and the total due from each subscriber in the collection 

124 



unit. These collection sheets were prepared in triplicate, the 
original and duplicate being mailed to the collection unit and the 
triplicate held in the war chest office. The original is returned 
to the war chest and the duplicate retained by the collector as his 
record. These sheets are all numbered serially and must be 
accounted for to the auditor. The only thing required of the 
treasurer who makes the collections is to fill in the proper 
column, showing the amount collected from each person, and to 
total that column, sending the amount of money which that total 
reveals. The sheet is then verified by the war chest cashier 
who dates and signs it and makes proper entry in his cash book 
and turns it over to the bookkeeping department, which posts 
the items to the proper ledger cards. The sheet then goes to the 
binder and becomes part of the permanent record. 

This plan has not secured wide adoption, apparently rather 
more than because it has not been thought of than for any other 
reason. It is a well-known fact that people do not like to have 
their neighbors and friends know that they are delinquent. The 
adoption of this plan brings a modicum of social pressure to bear 
in the direction of prompt payment. This plan, therefore, is one 
which deserves more attention than it has hitherto had. 

Bills — A few cities have found after some experience that 
it is worth while to bill regularly a certain class of people. One 
prominent city, for example, found a somewhat large delinquent 
list. On subjecting it to scrutiny, it was found that some well- 
to-do people and some rather prominent government officials 
appeared. The explanation was that these people were accus- 
tomed to receiving notices and frequently had their checks made 
out by secretaries who had not been informed of the pledge. 
The city then began to bill this class of subscribers and reports 
that there has been no further difficulty with delinquents of 
this type. 

The Patriotic Fund of Detroit has selected about three 
thousand names from its subscribers, which number several 
hundred thousand, and proposes to send bills to them. Roughly 
speaking, these people were all those who gave much more than 
one hundred dollars a year. Though the number is relatively 
small, this method will reach people whose aggregate gift 
amounts to about $3,000,000 out of a total war chest of $10,500,- 
000. Thus factory collections reach $4,500,000; purely volun- 
tary payment is expected of only $2,500,000. 

A number of cities also have people who have pledged to 
make their payments by mail. These cities bill such persons 
and the bills are returned through the mail. Some of the cities 
which use this plan report that it is the very best way of making 
payments. The city of Ely, Minn., sends out a postcard bill to 
all individual subscribers. 

The conclusion, from a study of reports on this topic and 
from personal inquiry in several cities, is that it is very well 

125 



worth while, if authorization to draw on bank account cannot be 
had, to bill a small number of persons whose aggregate gift is 
relatively large, the reasons being that it is more convenient to 
them as well as to the war chest office, more satisfactory, in 
short, from every point of view. 

Bank Drafts — One of the most interesting methods of col- 
lecting pledges which has been devised is the practice of having 
the war chest send to the subscriber's bank an official receipt 
which is honored as a draft upon his account. Because of the 
novelty of this idea in the East and the skepticism in regard to 
its practicability in cities which have not tried it, an especial 
effort has been made to discover how it operates in those cities 
which have undertaken to follow this method. 

Kenosha, Wis., reports: "We have one-third of the accounts 
which we collect in our office on this basis, or about five hundred in 
number. The receipt which we use is about the size of a standard 
check and is deposited on the twenty-fifth of every month so that it 
will g'et into the individual's' bank statement with the checks which are 
returned on the first of each month. All the trouble that it causes the 
contributor is to make a deduction on his check stub for the amount 
that he pledges. * * * It saves all collection charges. I can see no 
reason why anyone interested in having the soldiers' get all that is 
given for them should object to this plan of payment." 

The Montgomery Country war chest, with headquarters at Craw- 
fordsville, Ind., reports that "The information we gathered on this 
point is that in some places as much as 85% of the total subscription 
to the war chest wa,s paid through the banks in this way. Our bank 
collections! have not totaled anything like that much, but we are still 
receiving- these orders from subscribers when they come in to pay at 
the regular place of making collection. The subscribers who pay 
through the banks in this way get no receipt beyond the debit slip 
from the bank, which they find among their cancelled checks." 

'The Des Moines County war club, with headquarters at Burling- 
ton, Iowa, reports "We find this method very successful and many of 
those who signed the ordinary form are having it changed to the bank 
pledge as a matter of convenience. The banks handle the official 
receipt just the same as they would the pledge signer's check. This 
does not entail any extra work on the part of the bank. * * * It is 
one of the best plans and eliminates all chance of the pledg'e signer 
neglecting to pay at the stated time each month." 

Albuquerque, New Mexico, reports "We find the majority of those 
Who have bank accounts would rather pay that way than pay by check 
or by sending in their subscriptions. * * * The banks have taken the 
matter upon themselves and we have had no complaint from them. 
* * * The bank takes the receipt which is sent through the same as a 
check. The stubs and the cashier's check are sent back to our offices, 
where our clerk enters the names and the amounts in his book." 

The Davison County war chest of Mitchell, South Dakota, reports 
that the banks "welcome the use of the treasurer's receipt. They 

126 



preferred to handle it that way rather than have the contributor come 
in every month. The draft proposition could be hatnldled at the con- 
venience of the bank and not interfere so much with the regular busi- 
ness routine of the teller. * * * We met with very few objections 
from the people when we put that proposition up to them and im fact 
some have come in and changed their method of paying and now 
-authorize the bank to draw." 

The War Service League of Yellowstone County, Montana, with 
headquarters at Billings, says: "We think this pledge card the best 
one we have in use. It makes collections easy and practically with a 
minimum of annoyance to the subscriber. Fully one-third of our sub- 
scribers use this card, another third or more sign authorization on 
their payroll and something less than a third sign straight pledges 
to pay." In this instance the war chest headquarters fills out a debit 
notice in its own office for all the bank pledges and furnishes them 
to the banks on which the pledges are made. These are then listed 
on a regular credit sheet made up in duplicate, the bank retaining one 
copy and receipting the other for the war chest files. 

The only war chest which records any trouble with this 
pledge is that of Silver Bow County, with headquarters at Butte, 
Montana, and in that instance the difficulty came, not from 
objections to the plan but from misunderstandings as to just 
what was involved. The report says: 

"A great many people thought this was to designate the bank at 
which they were to pay. We had a great many designate a bank at 
which they had never had an account and others whose accounts were 
overdrawn, etc. We found, however, that to the average business 
man who carried an open account with the bank, this class of card 
was quite popular and since the drive we have used it quite exten- 
sively for such subscrib.ers. While I recommend the use of such a 
card, it is liable to be misunderstood and were we m-akinig another 
drive, I would not place this card indiscriminately among the captains, 
but would use it after the drive was over to simplify our bookkeeping. 
We consulted the banks before issuing the card and all the banks 
agreed to take care of their customers in that way, if they so desired. 
We filed with the bank an original pledge card and kept a copy in our 
office files. We have eight hundred such cards out of the twenty- 
iseven thousand subscribers and on the fifteenth of the month the 
cashier draws up all the receipts and presents them to the bank for 
payment. It is certainly a great convenience and time-saver and is 
no trouble to the bank any more than a check." 

These reports were given in detail, but they did not by any 
means exhaust the number of cities which have used this meth- 
od of making collections. Others were Anaconda, Mont., Lans- 
ing, Mich., Indianapolis, Ind., Osage City, Kan., Racine, Wis., 
and Sheboygan, and still others. An analagous plan has been 
used in some of the Boston banks for liberty loan installments 
and is said to work with entire satisfaction, both to the banks 
and the subscribers. 

127 



The conclusion is unescapable that inasmuch as the places 
which have used the plan find it wholly satisfactory, it has 
merit. Unquestionably, except in war time, there would be a 
good deal of objection, but circumstances are such that people 
generally recognize the necessity for doing business on unusual 
lines. The use of this scheme should be encouraged for that 
class of people who, under the plans adopted in Columbus, De- 
troit and other places, would be billed, namely, those people who 
give relatively large amounts and who are accustomed to having 
their personal affairs taken care of, to some extent, by assis- 
tants, and who without receiving a notice are likely to overlook 
payment. For such, this method is a real convenience and 
ensures that there will be no delinquents among a class where 
delinquencies speedily amount up to considerable sums. The 
wisest method of use seems to be that suggested by the secre- 
tary of the Silver Bow war chest, namely, to have the plan 
explained to the banks before the campaign and suggested to a 
selected body of subscribers afterward, rather than have the 
pledge card, which might be signed indescriminately and be 
misunderstood. 

Notes — Janesville, Kenosha, Racine, and Sheboygan report 
that for certain persons who have no regular banking connec- 
tions and who live in reg'ions where they cannot readily make 
payments to the war chest, it has been found worth while to 
make out a series of notes which are deposited in one of the 
banks. No data have been received showing the ultimate opera- 
tion of this plan, what proportion of subscribers use it, nor the 
way in which it is regarded by them. It saves the war chest, 
very obviously, from any necessity for getting after delinquents 
and ensures prompt and complete payment. This is particu- 
larly valuable because, as already indicated, these people would 
be more or less difficult to follow up because of the fact that 
they are scattered and somewhat inaccessible. * However, for 
communities such as those in Connecticut, there does not seem 
to be the same need for such a plan as this, and it may be doubt- 
ed whether in our communities individuals could be found who 
would agree to such a proposition. 

Following up Collections. 

A very large number of methods for following up delin- 
quent subscribers have been worked out. They may be cata- 
logued roughly as a reminder sent by mail, a professional collec- 
tor, a member of the home guard, a volunteer worker, the origi- 
nal solicitor sent back either as a reminder or as a collector, the 
boy scouts wdth bills, the use of the telephone, and newspaper 
publicity. This list does not exhaust all the expedients which 
have been adopted in various cities in order to make sure that 
collections remain at a high percentage. 

128 



Albany has a permanent organization known as the Loyal 
Legion, which is maintained in order to conduct campaigns of 
every sort and to follow up payments whenever it becomes nec- 
essary to do personal work. 

Dayton, Ohio, is maintaining the organization of the women 
of the homes division and they are to go to delinquents in order 
to remind them. The same system is being employed in Detroit. 
Terre Haute, which reported that there was a large percentage 
of delinquents in the voluntary payment group, gives the names 
to the lieutenants each month. In that city, however, the lieu- 
tenants are not intended to make collections but simply to act 
as personal visitors to jog the memories of delinquents, or to 
find out if there is reason for the delinquency and to try to brin^ 
improvement. Philadelphia has tentatively decided to follow 
the plan in operation in Dayton and Albany. Glens Falls and 
Herkimer are other cities which use the original solicitor in 
following up delinquent payments. 

Melrose, Mass., sends a written reminder which reads: ! 

"You are reminded thalt paymenit on your enlistment dated , 

amounting: to , has not yet been received. The success of 

the entire enterprise and the part our city is to play in bearing its 
share of the national funds' depends upon the regularity of our monthly 
receipts. All disbursements are made monthly and it is important 
that funds be promptly available to meet the urgent needs of our 
relief work. All members of the association are earnestly urged to 
cooperate by making their monthly payments promptly and thereby 
save delay, expense and burden of work to the officers." 

At the end of six months operation, Melrose plans to have a 
supplementary campaign using the original organization of 
solicitors. At that time all delinquents who have fallen seri- 
ously behind will be interviewed personally in order to discover, 
if possible, the reason and restore them to proper activity. At 
this same time newcomers in the community and those who 
were missed in the first drive will be seen. Butte, Montana, 
sends first a written reminder, and if that does not bring results, 
a paid collector is sent. 

Bolton Landing, N. Y., plans to publish the names of those 
who are seriously behind in their payments. Inasmuch as the 
population there is only 1200, it is possible for the war chest 
officials to investigate each case and probably no serious in- 
justice would result from the operation of that plan. The same 
idea is to be put in operation in Mount Sterling, Ohio. That 
town, also, has a small population and there is no reason why it 
should bring serious difficulties. It is extremely doubtful 
whether it would be possible to apply this scheme fairly in a 
large community, inasmuch as there are frequently legitimate 
reasons for delinquency and it would absolutely be unfair to 
pillory individuals before the public unless their cases had been 

129 



thoroughly investigated. Newberry, Michigan, has gone even 
further and states that the county committee "may bring action 
for unpaid contributions if they deem it advisable." It is serious- 
ly doubtful whether any war chest officials would go that far 
in practice. It might conceivably be done in one case which 
had been thoroughly investigated for its moral effect, but even 
so, it seems extremely questionable whether it would be a wise 
plan. While the pledge may be put in legal form, and while 
persons who do not act in good faith ought to have brought 
home to them the improper character of their action, the war 
chest is, after all, a free-will offering and when if ceases to be 
such it is not worth while attempting to collect money forcibly. 
A war chest should never threaten to- do something which it 
does not intend to do in practice, because it loses its claim upon 
public confidence by so doing. 

Nutley, N. J., follows up their delinquents through the 
members of the home guard, a plan which some other cities have 
followed. Racine uses a somewhat conspicuous follow-up 
slip for a reminder which reads as follows : 

"Allow us to remind you that your subscription has not been 

received for the period ending We trust that a gentle 

reminder of this kind will bring immediate response and may we ask 
you to remit promptly in future. Postage means money .out of our 
funds and you will appreciate that every cent is needed for our sol- 
dier boys, their dependents and other sufferers." 

The number of war chests which make use of paid collectors 
is relatively small, certainly a very distinct minority. A few, 
however, regard this as a wise m.ethod of procedure. Butte, 
Mont., for example, reports that the best method of making 
collections is to have a live collector who v/ill handle the matter 
in a business-like fashion. Other war chests which have adopt- 
ed this plan are Coaldale, Elkhart, Ilion, and Kane. Other 
cities object to this plan on the ground that where there is a 
collector, people will get in the habit of waiting until he comes 
before they get around to make their payment. Normally this 
work is done by volunteers because it is thought that it has a 
better moral effect, is more likely to be properly done, and is 
less expensive. 

Bookkeeping and Accounting. 

The problem of handling the v/ar chest accounts varies a 
great deal with the size of the city and the nature of the pledges 
which are taken. It would not be possible to set forth in full 
detail any large number of bookkeeping practices and it is not 
possible either to lay down categorical judgment as to which 
system is best. 

What this report shall attempt, therefore, is a brief sum- 
mary of a few of the more notable points in some of the systems 

130 



which have been adopted, without pretending to deal with the 
matter comprehensively. The intention is that it shall be sug- 
gestive rather than descriptive. Every city will have to devise 
its own system of bookkeeping. The points dealt with here 
may be helpful in avoiding pitfalls or in suggesting methods 
which might otherwise not be thought of. 

The Salem System — A scheme of bookkeeping and account- 
ing was devised for Salem, Mass., by Mr. J. Chester Crandell, 
C. P. A., 110 State Street, Boston, Mass., and its use is depend- 
ent on his consent. 

The idea underlying the system is to make it at once rapid, 
simple, air-tight against errors, and possible to audit both com- 
pletely and speedily. Each subscriber was given a permanent 
number which was entered on his pledge card, which in turn was 
filed in an envelope, also numbered. There was, in the second 
place, an alphabetical card index showing the name of the in- 
dividual, his address, his number, and also the number of the 
envelope in which his pledge card was filed. 

In the third place, each subscriber was given an envelope 
with twelve slips, at the top and bottom of which his number 
was printed. The subscriber in making payment entered his 
name, address, and amount on a slip which he brought with 
him to the war chest office. If he failed to bring his slip, there 
was a slip of distinctive color at the payment counter which 
he could fill out and the clerk ascertained his number from the 
alphabetical index, entering it upon his payment slip. 

When the subscriber presented his money and the deposit 
slip the clerk verified the two and rang up the payment in a 
cash register, inserting the deposit slip in a slot at the side. 
The' register printed the number of the transaction, the date,# 
and the amount on both the upper and the lower part of the 
slip, cut it in two, and deposited the upper part in the lock box, 
the lower part being returned to the subscriber as a receipt. 
The amount of course is rung up in plain sight of the subscriber 
and appears both on the deposit slip and on the cash register 
tape. 

At the end of the day the cash register tape is totaled and 
the deposit slips taken from the lock box and arranged in the 
sequence of the transactions in order to make certain that none 
has been lost. If in ringing up on the cash register a mistake 
is made the receipt which would ordinarily go to the customer 
is stamped ''Error" and notation is made on the back of the 
nature of the error. The spoiled receipt is retained and a new 
slip of distinctive color made out and put through the machine. 
At the close of the day when the deposit slips have been arrang- 
ed in the order of the transactions these "Error" slips are readily 
distinguished and are attached to the corresponding correct slips 
in order that the auditor may check them up and a pen and ink 
notation of correction is made on the cash register tape. 

131 



The deposit slips are then re-sorted according to their 
pledge numbers. This is done in order to post rapidly, for the 
ledger cards are filed numerically, a standard Library Bureau 
card being used with numbered tabs so that only one card is 
touched in selecting any individual's ledger account. 

The next step is posting to the individual accounts. The 
posting consists simply in stamping the date of payment in the 
proper space on the card, unless the individual has paid an odd 
amount. The regular monthly payment appears at the top of 
the card and experience has shown that people almost without 
fail pay in multiples of one month, not a month and a half, or 
three weeks, or any other part of a month. Hence, the amount 
of entry which has to be made by hand proves in practice to be 
extremely small. 

The amounts thus posted are put on the adding machine, 
and if the total agrees with the total of the cash register tape 
and the total of the deposit slips, it is obvious that the books 
balance. 

The cash register tape for each day is then pasted in a 
scrap book with proper notation of correction of errors, and 
becomes the cash book. The deposit slips for each day are put 
in an envelope and dated, so that when the auditor takes the 
books, or if ever any question arises, every single transaction 
can be readily located. 

Finally there is a loose-leaf book called "the register of 
pledges." This is arranged in a series of columns showing from 
left to right the serial number of the pledge, the number of 
the report .envelope in which the original pledge card is located, 
the name, address, cash payment at the time the pledge was 
given, and the monthly pledge. 

This system is rapid and practically proof against error 
in its application. The difficulty that people fail to bring in 
their deposit slips is one which must be faced, because that 
involves looking up their ledger numbers in the alphabetical 
file. On the other hand, it may fairly be said that it is neces- 
sary to look up relatively few, v/hereas if ledger cards are filed 
alphabetically all v/ould have to be looked up in some stage of the 
operations. 

Philadelphia — A war chest like that of Philadelphia and 
vicinity with 500,000 accounts involves a tremendous problem. 
The system used there was developed by Mr. Schoenbucher, C. 
P. A., the Comptroller, who enlisted a number of certified pub- 
lic accountants to take care of the work in several collection 
districts and obtained in this way voluntary service, the cost of 
which if paid for at the usual rates would have amounted to 
several thousand dollars. 

This plan is built about a coupon book, the cover and first 
two pages of which are marked with one operation on the type- 
writer by means of carbons and show the name, address, total 

132 



subscription, and monthly payment. The first page is a ledger 
card, which beside the other data shows the district number 
and the number of the individual account and has spaces for 
twelve payments. The third sheet is identical but of distinctive 
color, and is to be used for follow-up work. The remaining 
sheets are coupons and stubs, the coupon to be used as a deposit 
slip and the stub for receipt. Both bear the district number 
and the account number. 

When an individual makes his payment at any bank he 
must carry his coupon book with him. If he forgets his book 
there is no way for the bank to discover his nmiiber as there is 
in Salem, because of the decentralized method of collection. 
The bank in such a case must make out a memorandum. In 
normal cases, however, the individual fills out his coupon and 
stub with name, amount, etc., the bank stamps the receipt on 
the stub, and retains the coupon and the money. It puts the 
money on deposit to the order of the treasurer and sends the 
coupons in stout manilla envelops to Drexel & Company, Treas- 
urer, with a letter of advice stating the number and amount of 
coupons. 

The treasurer has a ledger marked "sundry depositaries" 
which contains an account with each bank. As the letters of 
advice come in they are retained by the treasurer for his post- 
ing, the number and total of the coupons is marked on the out- 
side of the envelope, and the envelope is then sent with its 
contents to w^ar chest headquarters. 

Each envelope is opened separately and the contents sorted 
for that bank by districts. The total from each envelope must 
equal that bank's letter of advice. In case the banks have re- 
ceived payments without coupons they have enclosed memoranda 
which are at this point checked up in an alphabetical file and 
proper coupons substituted. 

The coupons from each bank are then listed according to 
districts with the bank's number as well as name at the top 
of the sheet. Then the bundles of coupons, each with the bank's 
number on the outside, are thrown on a table which is built 
with boxes for each of the eight districts. Then the bank sheets 
are totaled for each district on a Duplex Burroughs, which 
shows the total for each district as well as the grand total. 
This of course again proves the account. 

The coupons for each division, still in bank bundles, are 
sent to the proper divisional accountants. These men list the 
coupons from each bank by their amounts and also by their 
serial numbers, the total for each bank as well as the grand 
total being taken on a Duplex Burroughs. This, of course, has 
to prove with the chief accountant's total. In doing this the 
total of the serial numbers is also taken for purposes which 
will appear later. The sheet just described becomes the cash 
book for that district and is its fundamental record. 

133 



The coupons are then sorted in their numerical order and 
the amounts are posted to the subscriber's accounts, which are 
arranged numerically and as the cards are posted they are 
ended up in the tray. The posting in Philadelphia is done by 
hand though there is no particular reason apparent why it could 
not be done with a rubber stamp or by machine. 

When the posting is complete the amounts together with 
the serial numbers of the ledger cards are put on the Duplex 
Burroughs. The total of the posting must agree with the day's 
total received. The totals of the serial numbers must agree 
with the previous totals of the serial numbers, this serving as a 
practical guarantee that no money has been posted to the wrong 
account, because the serial numbers are such a haphazard col- 
lection that the chance of getting a similar total from two sets 
is entirely negligible. 

Albany — Albany has adopted what is practically a straight 
savings bank system with ledger cards of four colors, one each 
for annual, semi-annual, quarterly, and monthly payments. A 
Burroughs posting machine and Library Bureau cards are used. 
The deposit slip is made out by the cashier, the original being 
returned to the subscriber as a receipt and the carbon retained 
as a deposit slip. 

Glens Falls — In this city the individual makes out a deposit 
slip and the account is at once put on the cash book and posted 
to an ordinary savings bank ledger card of distinctive color for 
the different methods of payment. There is a sheet which is 
used by factories in making payments for their employees which 
besides the serial number shows the name of the firm and in 
the spaces below the names of the subscribers and the amounts. 
There is also a column for remarks in order that a record may 
be kept of persons who leave or enter their employ. 

Syracuse — Syracuse after having employed for a ye^r a 
system built about a ledger arranged by street and number is 
changing to a system which rests on the ordinary savings bank 
methods. Their plan is interesting because, like Detroit and 
a few others, they do not propose to carry a separate ledger card 
for each subscriber who pays through some group but intend 
to have only one ledger card for each factory, store, or other 
collection unit. 

For each factory or store there is a sheet showing the firm 
name, address, and telephone number, then a list of employees 
with the amounts of the yearly subscriptions, followed by twelve 
columns in which check marks may be put for payments each 
month. When the factory reports the payments the amounts 
are not entered at all on these sheets but simply a check mark 
is made for purposes of doing the work rapidly. On this sheet 
too any necessary notes will be made, such as "left employ", 
"drafted", etc. This makes it possible, without carrying a 
ledger account, to tell an individual if he inquires how he stands, 

134 



or to make out a ledger account for him if it becomes necessary 
to carry his account individually. It would seem a rather better 
plan to me to rule the back of the pledge cards, to file these 
according to their factory groups, and to do the checking on the 
back of the pledge cards instead of having them on sheets. 
The reason for this suggestion is that in the course of a year 
a good many names will have to be entered on these sheets 
v/hich will require either interlinear corrections or the aban- 
donment of alphabetical order, and' many transcriptions .of 
names will inevitably have to be made. On the other hand, 
if the cards are used, it will be necessary only to transfer the 
position of the individual's card in the file, thus saving a good 
deal of labor. 

Columbus — A subscriber on paying at the war chest office 
fills out a deposit slip shov/ing the amount, name, and address. 
This is given in at the cashier's window and a cash register 
receipt received in return. These slips are filed until the close 
of the day, at which time they are posted into a cashier's counter 
collection sheet which shows the subscriber's name, address, 
and the number of the bank on which the check is drawn, as 
well as the amount. These entries are made after the slips 
have been sorted alphabetically and are posted to the counter 
collection sheets in alphabetical order. This is done for con- 
venience in posting to the ledger at a later time. 

.After the counter collection sheets are written up each is 
totaled, dated, signed by the cashier, and entered on his cash 
book. Obviously the total of the counter collection sheets and 
the cash register total must agree. 

The sheets are then sent to the bookkeeping department 
which posts the amounts to the ledger cards and the sheets are 
then put in a binder as part of the permanent record, being 
numbered consecutively for the convenience of the auditor. 

The ledger cards are filed alphabetically save that those 
of subscribers in collection units are kept together so that they 
can be more conveniently posted. In such cases instead of 
using a counter collection sheet the unit is sent a similar sheet 
with the names of subscribers and am.ounts due, which on its 
return carries the amounts paid. These sheets are signed by 
the cashier and the material on them is then posted to the 
ledger cards and the sheet put in a binder in the same way as 
counter collection sheets. 

The same plan is employed in Springfield, 0., and Dayton, 
0., with some Jocal modifications. All these cities either have 
begun or are now considering the use of machines for posting, 

Detroit — The only thing which it is necessary to say about 
the Detroit system of bookkeeping is that it has open accounts 
only for the individual subscribers, for each factory, or other 
unit of collection. The difficulties resulting from labor turn- 
over which are normal to this system are obviated by the fact 

135 



that the factories of Detroit underwrite the subscriptions of 
their employees. Thus the war chest office receives the same 
amount from each factory each month and there is no need 
to devise a system for explaining discrepancies. 

In the individual subscribers' division people in making 
their payments dictate the names and addresses which are put 
on the receipt slips, which are .numbered and made out in dupli- 
cate by carbon at the war chest office, in triplicate elsewhere, 
the original going to the subscriber, the first copy to the war 
chest, and the second copy being retained by the local collection 
agency. 

At the war chest office Vv^hen fifty people have paid and 
the receipt book is exhausted the teller retires, balances the 
accounts, puts the money and slips in an envelope, and then 
turns the envelope with its contents over to the auditor. 

Conclusions — It is not necessary to describe other book- 
keeping systems. It may be said that, in view of the experience 
of cities which have been very frank in their statements, there 
should be a separate ledger account for each individual, unless 
the Detroit plan of having factory and store subscriptions un- 
derwritten is employed. Second, the ledger cards of those who 
make their payments in groups through the units collection 
system should be filed according to their units and preferably 
in the order of the factory or store payroll. Third, there is no 
reason why in unit collections the posting should not be done 
with an ordinary rubber stamp showing only the date, so long 
as the amount of the monthly payment appears at the top of the 
card, or a posting machine may be used, simply locking in the 
folio number of the factory report sheet and putting the cards 
either in the order in which they appear on the factory report 
without bothering to record the amounts in each individual 
case. Fourth, it is distinctly advisable on the factory collec- 
tion sheet to have a column for delinquencies for, while it will 
be seldom used on account of the deduction plan, an individual 
may have been laid off or may have been ill or for other reasons 
may have become temporarily behind, and if no provision is 
made on the sheet this may cause some slight confusion. Fifth, 
the use of the coupon system after the fashion of Salem and 
Philadelphia is a very convenient method, particularly if com- 
munities are small enough so that people can be reminded 
through publicity to bring in their coupons. 

There are only one or two other matters which require any 
comment. For the most part they are of trifling character, yet 
they may cause a good deal of difficulty. In the first place, 
it is far better to use ledger cards manufactured in standard 
form by some regular concern. In the present condition of the 
market if one has his own ledger cards made locally the stock 
of different orders is not likely to be absolutely uniform and 
there will often be trifling differences in size. Both these de- 

136 



fects, tiny as they are, make handling difficult. In the second 
place, it is well to warn against the use of blue cards if the 
shade is at all dark, because it is trying on the eyes and some- 
times difficult to decipher, particularly if posting is done with 
pen and ink and a blotter used. In the third place, it is of 
doubtful wisdom — though done by many cities — to use the back 
of the pledge card as the ledger card. The reason for this 
judgment is that in copying on the typew^riter on the reverse 
side the stenographer must carry all the data in her memory, 
and copying therefore is more difficult. Moreover the cards 
are likely to be rumpled somewhat; furthermore, since one 
wishes almost inevitably to have a duplicate file for purposes 
of safety and copies must be made anyway there is no particu- 
lar reason why the copies should not be put onto the ledger 
card. In the fourth place, it is very desirable in the course of 
the campaign to have the factories or other collection units 
retain the pledge cards of their men and make out the first 
payment reports sheets in their own payroll order. Many 
pledge cards are so nearly illegible that they are hard to de- 
cipher, and after they have been turned in, it is difficult to 
resort them into their proper factory groups. If, on the other 
hand, they are retained at the factory the office force, being 
familiar with the names, can readily decipher them and there 
is no problem of sorting them into factory groups to be faced. 
Moreover the report comes in in proper order and ledger cards 
may be made out speedily and accurately. This idea which 
appears to have originated in Rochester has proved to be a 
splendid timie saver. 

It is pointed out elsewhere that it is unwise from a book- 
keeping standpoint to have pledges taken on the basis of per- 
centages or on the basis of so much time a week, because in 
some months there are five pay days, but not in the same months 
in different establishments owing to the use of different pay 
days. It is, consequently, difficult for the war chest books 
to be kept in such a way that they may be readily audited. This 
also presents the difficulty that the variation in a man's rate 
of pay makes an alteration in his subscription, which is con- 
fusing to the bookkeepers. Speaking from a, bookkeeping 
standpoint, therefore, subscriptions should be taken for a defi- 
nite amount and not on the basis of a percentage or so many 
hours a week. Some cities, while recognizing this fact, feel 
nevertheless that there are such notable advantages of other 
sorts in this method that this disadvantage must be borne. 



137 



CHAPTER FIVE. 



DISBURSEMENTS. 

Administrative Expenses. 

The nature and size of the administrative expenses of war 
chests and the methods employed in meeting them are extremely 
varied. In large cities the business is so great that expenses 
necessarily multiply. In one prominent city, for exam.ple, the 
war chest has three times as many accounts as the largest bank 
and very many more than the largest public utility. The ad- 
ministration of a fund of several millions of dollars with so 
many contributors to be followed up obviously requires expert 
work, which normally cannot be had on a satisfactory basis 
from volunteers though in some cases it is possible to use volun- 
teer help. Smaller funds, on the other hand, require much less 
office work and in a very small community the problem of col- 
lections may become so simple that practically no expense is 
involved. It is impossible therefore to m.ake a flat and catego- 
rical statement with regard to administrative expenses. The 
solution of the problems connected with this must be local. 
Large cities unquestionably need in each case an. expert execu- 
tive secretary and competent office staff, but by laying suffi- 
cient emphasis upon collections through stores and factories 
and by other efficient means they can keep the cost to a very 
low percentage. Size, methods of collections, bookkeeping 
methods, the possibility of securing volunteers, these and many 
other factors have a bearing. 

Of the cities which have repoii:ed about twenty have a paid 
executive secretary or office manager. Almost none has any 
other sort of paid officers though a few do have paid treasurers. 
Most of the rest employ only clerical help. There is one struct- 
ural difficulty which needs attention if a paid office manager 
is employed. Frequently questions of policy come before him 
and in some cities there is not sufficiently close integration 
between the executive committee and the office force. 

The methods of meeting administrative expenses vary as 
widely as the expenses themselves. A number report that there 
are no expenses. These fall into three classes : first, those who 
use voluntary assistance entirely ; second, those in which the 
municipality takes care of all the bills; and, third, those in 
which some bank has undertaken to take care of the whole 
problem. A rather surprising number report no expenses. 
Generally they are small communities. 

138 



Most of the cities meet the necessary expenses out of the 
war chest funds themselves ; others have separate funds to take 
care of the expenses of the campaign and the expense of admin- 
istration. Still others have separate campaign funds, but take 
the running expenses from the war chest. 

The argument in favor of a separate fund is that it saves 
the war chest from a great deal of criticism on the part of peo- 
ple who do not appreciate how large the administrative problem 
is, and who would therefore object to an office force and the 
payment of help because it looks to them like "graft." 

Columbus reported, for example, that this question was 
raised at the outset, and while the committee realized that in 
some instances the contribution to the separate fund might in 
practice amount only to a deduction from that individual's sub- 
scription to the war chest, they pointed out that it came, never- 
theless, from a person who recognized the need for an office 
force, and did not come from the subscription of a person who 
objected to the use of any part of his money for such purposes. 
It is carrying to its logical conclusion the privilege of allowing 
a man to designate how his gift shall be used. Just as men 
might be narrow-minded and indicate on their cards that they 
did not want some certain funds to participate, so these men 
could be broad-minded and indicate in this fashion their willing- 
ness that portions of their gifts should be used to pay office 
expenses. 

Columbus and the other cities which adopted this plan feel 
that it was one of their very best advertising features, and 
they played it up strongly that every cent contributed went to 
the soldiers and that not a penny would go into salaries or ex- 
penses of any kind. All agree that the results were notable 
in enlargements in the sums of money collected. It is evident 
that this line of argument has convinced the officials of the 
Red Cross, for it will be remembered that great stress was laid 
at the time of its Second War Fund drive upon the fact that 
$1.02 was spent for every dollar collected, that not a cent of 
the War Fund went into expenses, and that the interest derived 
actually increased each dollar by two cents. This was felt to 
be a splendid advertising feature and one which produced large- 
ly. There is this other statement to be made in favor of this 
idea, namely, that it relieves some of the pressure upon those 
in charge of the administration of the fund and allows them 
to do things which might seem extravagant to many, but which 
from the point of view of business administration, will pay in 
the end — for example, the purchasing of expensive machinery, 
such as cash registers, posting machines, etc. 

It ought to be said, further, that in a number of cities the 
war chest officials vigorously assert that the subscriptions for 
the separate administration funds are not simply deductions 
from subscriptions of the individuals in question to the war 

139 



chest, but in many cases represent additional subscriptions, so 
that the raising of this fund in itself represents a net addition 
to the amount of money at the disposal of the war chest. 

Cities which follow the contrary practice and meet the cost 
of administration out of the fund itself, insist that it is the 
only way in which they can really play fair with the public. 
They feel that the idea that a fund of some millions of dollars 
can be administered without expense is one which ought not to 
be encouraged. They insist that if the matter is faced frankly 
and openly on a common-sense basis no friction will develop. 
Admitting that a valuable advertising feature is lost, they argue 
that the war chest has sufficient emotional appeal in other di- 
rections and that it cannot be a purely monetary affair, but 
must have some educational value. These consideration have led 
many cities to meet the cost of administration out of the fund. 
Looking over the lists of those cities which do use separate 
funds and those which do not, it is very difficult indeed to see 
that one is predominantly more successful than the other. 

A few cities which met the expenses from the war chest 
itself felt that in order to reassure the public and at the same 
time ensure cautious and economical administration on the part 
of the officers, they ought to set a maximum. A typical illus- 
tration of this type of restriction is furnished by the by-laws of 
the Citizens' War Fund Association of Springfield, Mass., which 
gives power to the board of trustees as follows : 

"If necessary to meet the expenses of the Association, the board 
may appropriate therefor moneys from the general funds, not exceed- 
ing 1 V2 % of the total amount collected in any one year." 

Other cities have adopted 1% as the amount which the com- 
mittee is permitted to expend. 

There is no particular value in stating the amounts which 
committees have used for expenses, because they have meaning 
only when put in relation to other factors. It is interesting to 
notice, however, what percentages of the total are used by va- 
rious cities. Burlington, Iowa, reports its cost of administra- 
tion at lV-2.%, and Janesville, Wis., at 1%. Kenosha, Wis,, re- 
ports 0.9% for cost of administration and, if the cost of the 
campaign is included in the cost of administration, about 1.5%. 
Meriden estimates that the campaign alone cost about 1%, the 
cost of collection not being determined. Michigan City, Ind,, 
finds that the cost of administration amounts to 2% ; Nutley, 
N. J., to less than 2%; Plymouth, Ind., much less than 1%; 
Sheboygan, Wis., about 1% ; York, Pa., for administration costs, 
including the cost of the drive, 0.75%. Syracuse, N. Y., which 
has had the longest experience in this matter, reports that at 
the close of a year's operation the cost of administration has 
been less than 1% of the total amount collected and that more 
than half of that amount was gained by the war chest through 
interest on its deposits. 

140 



On the whole after hearing the arguments of both sides 
and considering the evidence which has been sent in, and which 
has been gathered by personal observation, it seems to me that 
the balance of the argument is in favor of meeting the expenses 
from the fund itself, that from the standpoint of its educative 
value it is the fair and wise thing to do, and that if a candid 
policy is pursued the monetary loss resulting from the refusal 
of prejudiced persons to subscribe is so slight as to be virtually 
negligible. Although many cities feel that the adoption of a 
separate administration expense fund has brought them large 
sums of money, it is impossible to check up their estimates. 
Cities which have paid the expenses out of the fund feel that it 
has not lost them any money. It is equally impossible to check 
up their estimates. The whole problem therefore must remain 
in last analysis a matter of opinion. 

Budgets. 

The problem of disbursing the funds collected for the war 
chest has unquestionably been the most difficult and delicate 
of the tasks involved. It is one, moreover, in which experience 
has not yet given so sure a guide as in many other of the 
questions which the war chest raises. Most war chests have 
not been long enough in existence to furnish a real test of the! 
value of their disbursing methods, so that one might reach a 
definite conclusion as to the very best form. 

The ideal method of disbursing money from a war chest 
is to follow a previously prepared budget. The budget princi- 
ple is distinctly in keeping with the war chest idea. It is also 
by far the best method to pursue from a psychological point of 
view. Unquestionably it gives people a very much better men- 
tal attitude and inspires confidence in them and brings home 
the concrete character of the needs if a budget with some detail 
is published. 

Furthermore the adoption of the budget system avoids any 
possibility of these large aggregations of money being regarded 
by some relief organizations as a sort of grab-bag. That is a 
problem which must be faced, because there are so many organ- 
izations in the field, many of them duplicative and some un- 
worthy, that care must be exercised. 

Aside from the budget method the best means for meeting 
this situation is to make up and publish an accurate list of all 
causes which are to receive support in advance of the time of 
the drive. 

Turning to a study of war chest practice in this matter 
it becomes evident that there are two very different sorts of 
so-called "budgets." The first is common to almost all kinds 
of war chests and amounts, practically speaking, to a more or 
less careful survey of the presumptive demands upon the com- 

141 



munity for the ensuing year, in order to determine what 
amount is to be raised through the war chest. The second type, 
much less common, is an itemized statement of the proposed ex- 
penditures from the war chest after the money has been raised. 

Taking up the first type and analyzing the illustrations 
of it so far as possible, it becomes evident that there are extra- 
ordinary differences in the proportions which the several com- 
munities feel ought to be maintained between the different war 
auxiliary organizations. One method of reaching the propor- 
tions is to take as the basis for computation the amount raised 
in the community during the previous year and then to assume 
that "the demands of all these organizations for the coming 
year will be greatly in excess of last year's requirements and the 
amounts provided for in the war chest" must be sufficient to 
meet these. The result of this process in the city in question 
was that the Second War Fund of the American Red Cross 
was set down for $10,000 and the Y. M. C. A. for $12,000, though 
it is only fair to say that they planned to make separate pro- 
vision for the local chapter of the Red Cross in the sum of 
$10,000, so that the appearance of giving more to the Y. M. C. A. 
than to the Red Cross is not wholly accurate. In that same city 
the K. of C. and Y. M. C. A. were figured in the budget in the 
ratio of five to twelve, which proves to be a fairly accurate 
forecast of the actual situation as it appears to have developed 
since. Most cities, on the other hand, while they do employ 
this method to some extent, use also other factors in attemping 
to forecast the needs of the war chest. Frequently they write 
to the various organizations to which they propose to give funds 
and ask for a preliminary estimate of how much is going to 
be required in the next financial campaign and then on the 
basis of their previous quotas in relation to given totals they 
figure out the probable demand which will be made upon them. 

One city gives the Red Cross War Fund $7,000, but the 
local Red Cross chapter $50,000 — certainly a most extraordi- 
nary ratio. It also gives the Red Cross membership $5,000, 
making a total for all Red Cross purposes of $62,000. That 
same city plans to subscribe $5,000 for the Y. M. C. A., and 
the Y. M. C. A. and K. of C. are to be supported in the ratio 
of five to four. Another city planned to give the Red Cross 
War Fund $12,500 and its local chapter $81,000. Still another 
instance reveals that the budget committee planned that the 
Red Cross and Y. M. C. A. should get roughly equal amounts, 
the Red Cross about $240,000 and the Y. M. C. A. approximately 
$250,000. The K. of C. in this case was set down at $50,000, 
in a ratio with the Y. M. C. A. of about one to five, and the 
Armenian and Syrian Relief at the same amount. Another 
illustration of the results reached is furnished by one city which 
provided in its preliminary estimates $12,000 for the local chap- 
ter of the Red Cross, $10,000 for the War Fund, and $3,500 

142 



for the Y. M. C. A., which is a ratio wholly out of relation to 
the actual demands which will be made upon the community 
as we now see them. This same community planned to give 
the K. of C. $1,000, which gave that organization in comparison 
with the Y. M. C. A. a ratio of one to three and one-half. 

There is a type of budget which stands mid-way between 
these preliminary estimates and the other type which will be 
dealt with in a moment, namely, a tentative schedule or basis 
which is prepared for the disbursement committee, but which 
the disbursement committee uses only for its own information 
and is not by any means bound to follow. One such budget 
gave the Red Cross seven times as much as the Y. M. C. A. and 
proposed to support the Y. M. C. A, and K. of C. in the ratio of 
five to four. Another was expressed in percentages and called 
for giving the Red Cross 70%, the Y. M. C. A. 15%, and the 
K. of C. 8%. 

It must be repeated and emphasized that these so-called 
"budgets" do not represent either actual or even prospective 
disbursements in most cases, but simply preliminary studies to 
determine the goal of the drive. Many of the apparent absur- 
dities in them will, in consequence, disappear in actual disburse- 
ments when the demands of the organizations are known more 
accurately than they could be known at the time when the war 
chests were put in operation, and reports from the various 
cities with regard to their productivity make it perfectly obvi- 
ous that almost all of them have sufficiently large contingent 
funds and over-subcriptions so that they will not fail to measure 
up to the quotas which may be assigned them. In many cases 
the funds will far exceed them. 

Even if one assumed contrary to fact that these represent- 
ed actual disbursements, they would still be an improvement so 
far as results are concerned over the drive system. Experience 
has shown that it is extremely difficult to find out how much 
was given for war relief last year in cities operating under the 
drive system and so to determine the relative amounts which 
went to the several organizations. Only the chairmen of the 
several drives had accurate information, and for many agencies 
which solicited only by mail or which approached relatively 
few individuals, there are usually no records whatever. When, 
however, such figures were available in anything like complete 
form they showed in many cases no reasonable proportions 
maintained in the amounts of support accorded the several 
agencies. For example, in many communities the Y. M. C. A. 
War Fund received more money than the Red Cross War Fund, 
though the Y. M. C. A. called for only about one-third as much 
as the Red Cross and raised in the country at large only about 
one-half as much as the Red Cross. 

This is not the place, nor is it necessary, to go into a de- 
tailed analysis of the proportion of the community gift which 

143 



went to the several agencies under the drive system. It is 
sufficient to remember that whatever the lack of uniformity 
and the occasional absurdity in war chests cities, the results 
in the latter appear to be more sane and more nearly in accord 
with the needs of the case than under the drive system. 

Turning now to the budgets which purported to make some- 
thing like final distribution of the money, it appears that these 
are of two sorts. The first is made flexible through the use 
of over-subscriptions. The second is much more nearly inflex- 
ible, its only elastic feature being a contingent fund, the use of 
which is left to the discretion of the disbursement committee. 

The budget of the Rochester Patriotic and Community 
Fund, so far as it relates to war work, reads as follows : 

"American Red Cross Second War Fund, $750,000 

American Red Crosis Local Work, 500,000 

Young Men's Christian Ass'n War Work, 600,000 

(%% of $80,000,000) 
Young Women''s Christian Ass'n War Work,.... 60,000 

(%% of $8,000,000) 
Knights of Columbus War Work, 150,000 

(%% of $20,000,000 
Jewish Relief and Wtelfare War Work, 102,000 

(%% of $13,600,000) 
Contingent Fund, 500,000 

Total, $2,662,000" 

The contingent fund was stated to include "the Salvation Army, 
Polish Relief, Armenian and Syrian Relief, American Fund for 
French Wounded, Serbian Aid Fund, Fatherless Children of 
France, Scottish Women's Hospitals, American Women's Hospi- 
tals in Europe, Permanent Blind Relief Fund, and any other 
war fund to which Rochester makes contribution." The bud- 
get further provided that ''in any over-subscription of the total 
budget presented herewith the major war funds will participate 
as follows: 

"1 — 'The American Red Cross Second War Fund will get prefer- 
ence up to $375,000 (50% of its quota). Such participation will give 
that fund $1,125,000, none of which will be subject to refund to the 
local chapter, 

2 — ^If the over-subscription exceeds $375,000, the other war funds. — 
viz: the American Red Cross (local work), Y, M. C. A. War Work, 
Y. W. C. A. War Work, K. of C. War Work, Jewish Relief Welfare 
Wiar Work, and the contingent fund — will participate pro rata until 
the participation of each amounts to 50%. 

8 — In any over-subscription in excess of such 50% all the major 
war funds, including the American Red Cross Second War Fund, will 
participate pro rata." 

144 



It is perfectly obvious that the demands of the Fosdick agencies 
were figured incorrectly, because of the sudden and large in- 
creases in their amounts which have since taken place. As a 
matter of fact, however, none of the organizations will suffer 
because of the extremely careful way in which provision was 
made for over-subscription. This budget, particularly in its 
relation to local philanthropies was a very able piece of work. 
It indicates the opinion of the committee as to the paramount 
importance of the Red Cross. This is further indicated by the 
fact that the local vv^ork of the Red Cross is given an amount 
which means that the gifts for the Red Cross will be, roughly, 
twice those for the Y. M. C. A., and that the Y. M. C. A. is 
to get about four times as much as the K. of C. This budget, 
however, demonstrates that the most careful investigation by 
able men, under the conditions which existed at that time, it 
was impossible to ascertain even approximately the amounts of 
money which would be called for by the various organizations. 
The Y. M. C. A. demand has since increased $20,000,000, the 
K. of C. has more than doubled its call, and the Y. W. C. A. has 
practically doubled its demand. 

Detroit also built a budget on the principle of giving about 
11/2% of the national quota instead of the %% which Rochester 
planned for. Like Rochester, Detroit made provision for over- 
subscription. In the latter city, moreover, the 11/2% was not 
so rigidly adhered to, for more than that amount was assigned 
to the Jewish w^ork inasmuch as they had demonstrated the year 
before that they could raise more money than that percentage 
of the total would have brought. On the other hand, less than 
that percentage was assigned to the Armenian and Syrian Re- 
lief because the organization in charge of that agency had con- 
sistently failed to get the amount of money which it asked for. 

The Detroit war funds were as follows: 

American Red Cross, $3,000,000 

Young Men's Christian Association, 1,500,000 

Knights of Columbus, 500,000 

Jewish War Sufferers, 325,000 

Armenian and Syrian Relief, 200,000 

Young Women's Christian Association, 150,000 

War Camp Community Sei*vice, 112,500 

Salvation Army, 35,000 

Jewish Welfare Board, 25,000 

Resei've Fund, < 500,000 

Tota^l, $6,347,500 

Detroit, like Rochester, made provision for pro rata participa- 
tion in over-subscription of the total amount called for. Inas- 
much as the $3,000,000 assigned to the Red Cross was to be 

145 



divided about equally between the War Fund and the local chap- 
ter, the ratios of this budget appear to be fairly closely in 
accord with the demands made, although it cannot be said that 
they are accurate. 

A more inflexible type of budget is found in Cleveland, 
which did not adopt the principle of over-subscription and which 
therefore cannot make with the same ease the corrections of 
the errors which arise of necessity from the inability of the 
budget committee to find out accurately what the demands of 
the various organizations are to be. Cleveland's budget assign- 
ed the Red Cross a total of $2,500,000, of which 25% was to go 
to the support of the local Red Cross for which no separate ap- 
propriation was made. The Y. M. C. A. was assigned less than 
half the Red Cross amount, getting $1,200,000. The Knights 
of Columbus was assigned one-fourth the amount of the Y. M. 
C. A. gift, namely $300,000. There was in addition a contin- 
gent fund of $650,000, from which "worthy and approved re- 
quirements for unclassified relief funds will be met as such 
needs develop during the balance of the year." In fairness to 
the committee in charge at Cleveland, it ought to be said that 
in addition to the flexibility introduced by the contingent fund, 
there is the further fact that the duration of the war chest is 
only for six months, which makes it much more possible in 
normal circumstances to look forward and accurately gauge 
the probable demand. 

This sketch of the operation of budgets under the various 
plans which have been attempted must not lead to the conclu- 
sion that the war chest is absurd in the matter. It simply 
reveals how difficult the situation has been under the condition 
of almost complete lack of control of war relief agencies, even 
with the most careful investigation to get an accurate forecast 
of the demands which are to be made upon the community. 
As a matter of fact this has not operated in the direction of 
cutting down the support of the war agencies, because commu- 
nities have recognized the fact that they could not look forward 
accurately and have practically always set their goal a good 
deal beyond the anticipated demands and in almost every in- 
stance have secured an over-subscription of what they did call 
for. There is every evidence that there will be funds enough 
and that even in the cities with budgets the proportion of dis- 
tribution will be fair. 

Other Methods of Disbursement. 

In contrast with the budget system of disbursement em- 
ployed by a few cities, there is the plan of having the funds of 
the war chest paid out upon the vote of some committee. 

The composition of this committee varies widely under dif- 
ferent plans adopted by the several cities. Some are made up 

146 



of persons appointed by the Governor as a county' committee 
or war board, or war council, or however it may be known. 
The most common plan is to have the disbursement committee, 
made up of the officials variously known as Board of Control, 
Board of Governors, Board of Trustees, or Executive Commit- 
tee. In a few instances the disbursing committee is made up 
of a sub-committee of the trustees, governois, etc. 

The original plan developed by Syracuse has been followed 
by a large number of war chests. It consists of a committee 
independent of the trustees, save for two ex-officio members 
and has but nine members, the small number being one of the 
essential elements of the plan. The success of this method 
depends upon the broadly representative character of the per- 
sonnel and upon the large-mindedness of the m.en and women 
who compose the disbursement committee, as well as upon their 
capacity for altering their opinions. This plan has worked out 
extremely well in Syracuse, N. Y., because in that city the 
members of the disbursement committee have displayed a keen 
sense of their responsibilities and have pursued. a policy which 
has constantly broadened as the war has gone forward. 

A second type of disbursement committee follows practical- 
ly the same lines save that it is of larger size, usually about 
fifteen to twenty members. This idea is somewhat more dif- 
ficult to put in operation because of the fact that it is more 
difficult to get that many people together, it is harder to get 
that many to inform themselves thoroughly and reach harmo- 
nious conclusions. Nevertheless where discretion has been used 
in the selection of members it has succeeded notably. 

Some cities have felt that in the expenditure of funds there 
ought to be more than a bare majority recorded in favor of a 
project, and have made provisions by which an extraordinary 
majority is required. For example, Kenosha, in its by-laws 
provides that "no appropriations of any donation funds shall 
be made without the two-thirds vote of all the members of 
the committee." The fractions used vary from two-thirds to 
four-fifths. In many cases where an extraordinary majority 
is required, the disbursement committee is a much larger body 
than is usual in most cities, running up occasionally as high 
as forty or fifty members. The answer to this plan, which is 
made by those who believe strongly in the practice inaugurated 
by Syracuse, is that a committee should be so well informed, 
so open-minded and should take sufficient time so that the 
sums needed by the various agencies would be voted with sub- 
stantial unanimity. That is to say they believe such a spirit 
should be created in the disbursement committee, that no one 
would press for action until persons of open mind and candid 
disposition could reach substantial agreement. 

A number of cities have felt that it was necessary to rely, 
to some extent at least, upon a preliminary investigation com- 

147 



mittee. Akron, Ohio, for example, has a committee to which is 
given the task of investigating all requests for funds. After 
that committee has reported, a budget committee determines 
whether the quota which has been assigned is proper. The 
reports of these two committees are then put before the execu- 
tive committee for final action. This is distinctly the most 
elaborate illustration of this type of committee that has been re- 
ported. Occasionally the investigation committee is not per- 
manent. For example, in Glens Falls a new committee is ap- 
pointed by the president of the association each time there is 
an application for funds and, after looking into the matter, they 
report back to the board of directors for action. 

Nearly all war chests have some method of preliminary in- 
vestigation, and this is frequently by means of a questionnaire 
which is sent to the various organizations which desire funds. 
The Kenosha blank has been used by a number of cities and 
reads : 

"The .'. society hereby makes applicatioin to the Patriots 

Fund Committee, Kenosha County, for the sum of $ , as the 

contribution of Kenosha County, Wisconisin,, to cover the period 
of. months, for (main purpose of org-anization). 

Organization. 

1 — Have you a National Organization? (Yes or No) 



2 — List the Officers therof, with address 

3 — Have you a Wisconsin State Organization? (Yes or No) _ 

4 — List the Officers thereof, with address _ 

5 — Has this application for funds been authorized by any of the above 
officials ? (Yes or No) When How 

Levy 

6 — Is this application a part of a National Campaign for funds? 

(Yes or No) _ 

7 — Amount to be raised in the United States $ for „ _ 

months' period. 

8 — On what basis was the quota of Kenosha County determined? 

9 — Are equal monthly payment satisfactory? (Yes or No) _ 

10 — If not, state reason _ _...„ 



Purpose. 

11 — State specifically how money is to be spent by giving budget, or 
listing large items - _ 

12 — Is this work in any way a duplication of the American National 

Red Cross ? (Yes or No) _ — - 

Or of any other national organization now in existence? (Yes or 
No) _ „ - - -...„ 

13 — Explain as fully as possible, why there should be a special organ- 
ization for this work _ — 

148 



14 — Has this camipaign been approved by: 

a — American National Red Cross? (Yes or No) 

b — War Department Commissioin on Training Camp Activities? 

(Yes or No) - _ „ 

c — Wlisconsin State Council of Defense? (Yes or No) „ 

d — Other Authorities? _ 

15 — ^Has the Wisconsin State Council of Defense made special investi- 
gation of this appeal for funds? (Yes or No) When. 

16 — Will you submit reference? _ , 

a — Bank reference _ _ 

b — Other references „ 

17 — If you have not already done so, please send: 

a — Your printed literature, telling purposes and plans already 

carried out, or in contemplation; 

b — Recent printed reports of income and expenditureis ; 

c — Any other data that will assist the committee in determining 
the merits of the cause _ _ _ _ 

Salem's blank is as follows: 

Name of National Organization ? _ 

Address, _ _ - 

Incorporated, _ - » 

President, - 

Secretary, 

Treasurer, _ - - 

Name of Local Branch, 

President, 

Secretary, - ~ 

Treasurer, 

National amount asked for year 1918, $ _ 

By whom is this amount determined? _ 

How do they arrive at their decision? „ 

National amount raised for year 1917 $ ?._ _ 

Amount asked of Salem for year 1918 $ — 

Amount raised in Salem for the year 1917 $ _ _ 

For what purpose to be expended? (Give detail and budget) 

What was the per capita response in other communities in which cam- 
paigns were conducted? : 

Mention several communities, if possible 

What amount is now asked for this purpose of Beverly $ _ , 

Lynn $ , Newburyport $ , Haverhill $ ? 

If award is made, to whom should check be made payable? _ 

That of Columbus follows: 

The undersigned organization desires to be a recognized War Relief 
Agency through which the funds of the Columbus Community War 

149 



Service shall be distributed and presents the following information for the 
considerration of the Executive Committee in determining what proportion 
of its funds should be allotted to this organization. 

1 — Name of Organization 

2 — National Address Local Address „ 

3 — When organized Wherei 

4 — Objects, 

5 — Whom is organization trying to benefit? 

6 — What is your plan of applying _ these benefits or accomplishing your 

object? :. „ 

7 — What other organizations are doing similar work, in whole or in 

part, for the same beneficiaries ? 

8 — Names and addresses of principal officers, _. 

President, _ 

Vice-President, 

Secretary, 

Treasurer, 

Executive Officer, _ „ 

Chairman Board of Directors, _ 

Names of Board of Directors or Controlling Body, 

9 — Names of local officers, _ _ 

Names of local board, _ 

10 — Explain how moneys and material collected are transmitted and 

distributed to those for whom they are intended,.... 

11 — ^Does a copy of last annual report or other reports with itemized 
statement of incomes and expenditures for past fiscal year or for 

some other period accompany this application? 

If not, why not? _ 

Period covered by above report, 

12 — When doe® your fiscal year begin? 

13 — By whom are your accounts audited ? 

Date of last audit ? 

14 — By whose authorization are your funds distributed? 

15 — How are your checks signed and countersigned? _ 

16 — The following are the only paid workers connected with the organ- 
ization and the following amounts set opposite the names of said 
workers are the only money compensations received by them as 
salary, commission or otherwise: 

Name Amount 

17 — What facts will help determine the proper amount for Columbus 

to contribute to this organization? 

a — Total amount to be raised in nation, 

b — Basis of Franklin County quota, if allotments are made, $ 

c — -From what sources have you derived your funds heretofore ? 

d — Name and address of person in your organization to whom 

checks should be made payable, 

18— W,e herewith submit: 

a — Copy of last annual report with itemized statement of income 
and expenditures, _ 

150 



b — Copy of last auditor's statement, - 

c — Literature showing scope of work and such other information 
as is available showing to what war needs the funds are 
applied, - 

d — Copy of budget for coming period this application covers, 

The disbursement committee in Youngstown is called a 
distribution committee. It determines the object which is to 
receive money and the amount which should be appropriated. 
If the amount is less than $10,000, no confirmation of its action 
by the full board of directors, known as the council, is necessary. 
If it is more than $10,000, on the other hand, the appropriation 
must be confirmed by the council. In either case the action of 
the committee is published for three consecutive days in two 
daily papers, after which seven days must elapse before any 
payment is made, presumably to give opportunity for protest 
and criticism. 

Springfield, Mass., allows disbursements to the previously 
recognized organizations on a vote of a simple majority of trus- 
tees, but for any organization not specifically recognized by the 
war chest association at the time of its drive, a three-quarters 
vote is necessary. The idea of this, of course, is to prevent raids 
upon the fund, and its wisdom is demonstrated by the fact that 
when the success of the war chest was noised abroad, all sorts 
of organizations called upon it for money. This provision 
guaranteed against any possibility that raids upon the treasury 
would be successful. 

Various committees in charge of disbursements for war 
chests have worked out tentative bases on which to determine 
what their proper quotas should be. This is frequently express- 
ed in a percentage of the total national demand for which they 
feel themselves fairly responsible. Thus, for example, as al- 
ready indicated, Rochester takes three-quarters per cent, of the 
national budget and Detroit one and one-half per cent. The 
difficulty comes from the fact that various cities take different 
means of reaching percentages. Some go entirely on the basis 
of population, which is obviously improper. Some go on the 
basis of a comparison of the total wealth in taxable property, 
bank deposits, and population in relation to the whole United 
States. Some derive their percentages from their Liberty Loan 
quotas in relation to the total. Still others determine them on 
the basis of the amount of money raised last year for the causes 
to v/hich they contributed and base their percentages on the 
relation of those amounts to the total raised in the country. 
Occasionally this work is undertaken for a whole state. For 
example, the State of Washington, through its council of de- 
fense, has determined that it will not "approve a quota for the 
state in excess of 1% of the total quota for the United States." 

151 



This is based *'on what is considered an equitable ratio of popula- 
tion and fixed and liquid wealth and is approximately the per- 
centage asked of this state in the First, Second, and Third Lib- 
erty Loan campaigns, and in the First and Second Red Cross 
War Fund campaigns." There is also a county quota which is 
fixed by the state council of defense on the basis of school pop- 
ulation, bank deposits, and equalized assessed valuations in 
ratio to the corresponding items for the state at large. Then 
each county's distribution of the quota is determined by the 
county council of defense. Thus it becomes evident that states 
and cities have made serious attempts to develop percentages 
which will serve as some more or less accurate test of the fair- 
ness and propriety of the quotas which are assigned them by 
various organizations and have also attempted to introduce an 
element of uniformity among these quotas which is wholly lack- 
ing under the drive system. 

As to the personnel of these various committees, almost 
always an attempt is made to make them representative of the 
different classes in the community, it being wise to see that the 
manufacturers, the merchants, the laborers, the various relig- 
ious sects, and the women are all properly recognized. Ordinar- 
ily officials of the Red Cross, Y. M. C. A., and other beneficiary 
organizations are not included as ex-officio members, although 
occasionally they are so included. For obvious reasons the 
members of the disbursement committee are nevertheless per- 
sons vitally interested in the leading agencies. 

This has been criticised sharply in some quarters. Mr. 
Wm. J. Norton, the Secretary of the Detroit Patriotic Fund, 
says, for example, that it is a mistake to place the control of 
the movement outside of the participating agencies. He in- 
sists that control should be in a cooperative group representing 
the chief participants. In Detroit the Patriotic Fund is govern- 
ed and directed by a group of people who do represent the Red 
Cross, Y. M. C, A., the Jewish agencies, the Catholic movements, 
and the Community Union. Thus control is vested in the most 
vitally interested persons. 

As to experience with disbursements, there has been, broad- 
ly speaking, very little friction. In two cities there was con- 
siderable flurry when an appropriation was made by the war 
chest to the Knights of Columbus. Certain persons stirred up 
trouble and there were threats of cancellation of subscriptions 
and the like. In one of these cases, without j,ny pussy-footing 
whatever, the treasurer made a frank statement in the papers. 
Most of the newspapers commented editorially. The whole 
excitement passed in a day or two and no harm resulted. In 
the other case the committee refused to explain, made no effort 
whatever to inform the public, and some hard feeling was en- 
gendered. This indicates that this whole question turns on the 
use of tact and good, hard common sense. 

152 



In another city an appropriation was planned to furnish 
uniforms for the Home Guard. Certain elements of the labor 
group believed that the Home Guard in that area was an organi- 
zation which was designed to put down strikes and offered 
objection. It is probable too that some other elements of the 
public felt that money which was raised on the ground that it 
was to be given to the soldiers could not justifiably be spent 
for that purpose. At all events the request for the appropria- 
tion was withdrawn. In this case the disturbance was brief, 
and on the whole it seems to m.e a not unhealthy thing, because 
it indicated the way in which public opinion can and does con- 
trol the expenditure of funds under the war chest plan, and 
evidences a healthy interest in the disposition of its money, 
whether or not one agrees individually with opinion in any 
given instance. 

The chief difficulty in disbursements, however, comes from 
the organizations themselves in their efforts to get funds. In- 
evitably the disbursement committee feels an impulse in execu- 
ting its trust to investigate carefully. Some organizations ob- 
ject to being investigated. They resent what seems to them an 
imputation upon the propriety of their demands. Others do not 
like to have the cities question the assigned quotas. Still others 
do not like to have the cities restrict themselves to paying only 
the amount of the assigned quota. There is perhaps some justi- 
fication for some of this irritation on the part of some of the 
organizations, for possibly a few disbursement committees have 
been a trifle officious. But, broadly speaking, this is a diffi- 
culty which has arisen from the chaotic condition of the whole 
war relief situation. Betterment rests upon the introduction of 
some methods of control and upon the tact and good sense of 
local communities on the one hand and of the representatives 
of the organizations on the other. 

At all events the problem of making disbursements from 
the war chest is now becoming very much simpler as the result 
of a number of developments. In the first place, it is known 
now that a more active supervision of the financial calls of the 
Fosdick agencies is being undertaken at Washington. They 
are henceforth to have budgets which have been officially ap- 
proved after careful scrutiny. Moreover the grouping of these 
agencies in their financial efforts involves the fixing of ratios 
to be preserved among them in a more or less official manner. 
Thus it will not be necessary for cities to make up their minds 
individually as to the ratio which is to be preserved, but under 
the war chest plan they can make disbursements to them in the 
official ratio. 

In the second place, the accumulated experience of cities 
is becoming available and has larger and larger value. 

In the third place, there are in process of formation various 
associations of war chests, and there has now been organized 

153 



a national association of war chests which is planning a Nation- 
al Investigation Bureau. The secretary in charge is Mr. Barry 
C. Smith of the Charity Organization Society of New York. 
The bureau proposes to publish an approval list of war activi- 
ties after having secured and made available detailed financial 
information. This will make it possible for war chests to de- 
termine with reasonable accuracy the proper and desirable 
amounts which they should appropriate to the very many unof- 
ficial agencies, which nevertheless have value and which should 
receive some support. 

While, therefore, the ultimate responsibility for disburse- 
ment must still rest with the individual community, the conclu- 
sion is inescapable that the knotty problem is in process of so- 
lution and that the dangers of politics, of raids, bickerings, and 
dissatisfaction, which have never been serious in practice, are 
becoming constantly less. 



A suggested set of By-Laws follow: 

Article I — Name. 

The name of this association shall be the War 

Chest Association (Citizens' War Fund Association) or (War 
W^ork Council). 

Article II — Objects. 

The objects of this association shall be to provide ways and 

means for raising funds in the city (county) of 

and to that end to solicit and receive contributions and to appor- 
tion and disburse the same as follow^s: 

1 — To the following organizations upon the affirmative 
votes of a majority of the full Board of Trustees : 

(a) The American Red Cross and its local chapters. 

(b) The organizations operating under the sanction and 
control of the War and Navy Departments' Com- 
missions on Training Camp Activities. 

(c) To any other agency which has direct endorsement 
from the President of the United States. 

154 



2 — To the following organizations upon the affirmative 
votes of three-fourths majority of the full Board of 
Trustees : 

(a) (Here name all other war 

(b) auxiliary agencies that are 

( c ) to participate. ) 

3 — To the following organizations upon the affirmative 
votes of a majority of the full Board of Trustees: 

(a) To support the activities of the War Bureau. 

(5) To finance the Liberty Bond Campaign Committee 
or other committee in charge of the work for the 
United States Government. 

(c) For the support of the Farm Bureau. 

(d) To meet the necessary expenses of this association, 
provided that the amounts appropriated for that 
purpose shall not exceed 2% of the total amount 
collected in any one year. 

Article III — Membership. 

All contributors to the funds of this association who are 
over eighteen years of age shall be enrolled as full members. 
Membership shall be forfeited by any person who is delinquent 
more than thirty days in a payment due upon his subscription. 
The privileges of membership shall be restored when full pay- 
ment of the delinquency has been made. 

Every member shall be entitled to one vote at any meeting 
of this association. 

Article IV — Officers and their Duties. 

The officers of this association shall be a President and a 
Vice-President, chosen each year by the Board of Trustees from 
among their own number; a Treasurer and a Secretary, who 
shall be appointed by the Board of Trustees. (If the Board of 
Trustees is made large, provision should be incorporated for an 
Executive Committee.) 

The Trustees shall be limited in number to , of 

which three shall be appointed annually by the War Bureau. 
The remainder shall be elected at the annual meeting of the 
association and shall hold office for one year and until their 
successors have been elected. The elective Trustees for the first 

year shall be (Here follow names) 

155 



The government of this association shall be vested in the 

Board of Trustees, whose duties and powers shall be as follows : 

(a) To make any and all rules and regulations for the 

conduct and control of the Board and the affairs of the 

association. 

(5) To make any and all rules and regulations relative to 

conducting campaigns for soliciting and collecting funds. 

(c) To determine from time to time the equitable and 
proper amount of funds which shall be apportioned and 
disbursed, and when and in what manner the same 
shall be distributed. 

(d) To appoint all committees and determine the duties of 
the same. 

(e) To appoint all employees and determine the compensa- 
tion, if any, of the same. 

(/) To fill all vacancies in the Board of Trustees or in any 

committee or office. 
(g) To decide all questions of construction of the by-laws. 

Such decision shall be final. 

A majority of the Trustees shall constitute a quorum for the 
transaction of business, except as provided in Article II. 

The President, or in his absence the Vice-President, shall 
preside at all meetings of the association. The President shall 
be a member ex-officio of all committees. 

The Treasurer shall be charged with and have the custody 
of all funds of the association and shall pay out the same upon 
the direction and warrant of the Board of Trustees. He shall 
perform all the duties incident to his office as he may be directed 
by the Board of Trustees. He shall be required to give a bond 
for the faithful performance of his duties in such sum and with 
such sureties as the Board of Directors shall determine. 

The Secretary shall issue all notices required to be given to 
members of the association or others. He shall make and keep 
a true and complete record of all meetings of the association and 
of the Board of Trustees and he shall have custody of the records, 
by-laws and the corporate seal and shall conduct the correspond- 
ence and perform all such duties as shall be required by the 
Board. 

Article V — Meetings. 

The annual meeting of this association shall be held on 
(date) in each year at such hour and place as the 

156 



Trustees may determine. A notice of such meetings shall be 

published in newspapers at least one week before the 

date of such meeting. 

' Special meetings of the association may be called by the 
President of the Board of Trustees at any time, and notice 
thereof shall be given in the same manner as for the annual 
meeting. 

Twenty-five members shall constitute a quorum for the 
transaction of business at any meeting. 

Meetings of the Board of Trustees may be called by the 
President or by members, and notice of such meeting shall be 
given by a written or printed notice mailed at least two days 
prior to the date set for such meeting. 

Article VI — Amendments. 

These By-Laws may be altered, amended or repealed at any 
meeting of the Board of Trustees, notice in writing of such 
amendment having been given to each Trustee at least two days 
before such meeting. 

(These suggested By-Lmvs have been compiled after study 
of a number of forms, but chiefly from those of Springfield, 
Mass., and Lexington, Mass.) 



157 



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